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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27759265">when the time's right, meet me in the end line</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/luthorstark/pseuds/luthorstark'>luthorstark</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Supergirl (TV 2015)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Lena Luthor Knows Kara Danvers Is Supergirl, Post Season 5, Sharing a Bed, Smut, if there's only one bed there's a sinfully good fuck, kara finally gets to teach lena about krypton, supercorp adventures in argo, supercorp is my emotional support yet my emotional baggage, traded williboy for two seconds of red daughter and a fake cactus</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-27</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 21:47:37</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>55,570</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27759265</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/luthorstark/pseuds/luthorstark</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Kara’s always known her best friend is beautiful; evoking in its dark dramatism and so effortlessly captivating—but that’s her friendly bid. Stuck in the limbo of trying to save their relationship while defeating Lex, she doesn’t know how to act around Lena, but it’s time for a firm push towards the truth.</p><p>or:</p><p>“What the hell is this?"<br/> <br/>“This is Argo– this... we are in Argo. I don't know–“ Kara stops, out of breath–“I–... I don’t know how we got here, but this is all that's left of Krypton.”</p><p>or:</p><p>as a farewell gift from lex, kara and lena get stuck in an alternate reality shaped like Argo. she teaches lena about her culture while they fall deeper in love and have some essential conversations to move forward</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Alex Danvers/Kelly Olsen, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Querl Dox/Nia Nal</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>48</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>307</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. bottled up</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i can't handle the idea of supercorp not being obnoxiously in love, it makes me ache and want to rip my heart out just for them.</p><p>trigger warnings (updating with every new chapter):</p><p>violence, blood</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>After the ghost of Lena's grip withdraws from her hand—their first genuine contact in way too many ages—Kara realises that she has been starving for that touch for as long as she can remember. </p><p> </p><p>A new, fulfilling hope blossoms within her boundaries, bathing her in melancholy and yearning that almost drives her to wrap her arms around Lena, but the memories of the last few months ingrained in her night terrors nail her heels to the ground before she can flesh out her vivid dreams. </p><p> </p><p>That night, the mattress is softer as she sinks into it and into the lightness of her chest. The tons of guilt and regret that flood her since that atrocious revelation in the Fortress finally dwindle to the average feeling of not belonging that’s a chip on her shoulder since her pod crossed the borders of Earth without permission.</p><p> </p><p>Mornings, too, gleam in over-saturated colour below her as she soars through the globe. The ripples of the ocean are more blue, the mountains are greener as she lowers her height and fingers brush the sprinkled lawn—that distinct hue makes her long for the identical shade waiting for her at home—and life is seven tones of rainbow again.</p><p> </p><p>Having Lena by her side is exhilarating. To turn around knowing that she’s a permanent fixture every step of the way injects Kara with an itch to return to the labs and, carrying bags of food, she is on top of the world.</p><p> </p><p>The quarter’s doors open before her and pale eyebrows crease in a bitter curve as she watches Lena check Brainy's signs, alone and away from the rest of the team, as if they were children and she had been exiled from the playground.</p><p> </p><p>Kara floats to her like bounded by a spell, dying to get a closer look.</p><p> </p><p>She still can't commit to one reason alone; maybe Lena has clicked on Nia's latest articles, or there’s the infinitesimal chance she grew tired of the uncomfortable attire that is a bit too much to be locked in a lab, but now she seems to be a proud tight fitting jeans advocate, woven on her silhouette and threaded to her hips by a belt with two golden interlocked C’s as the buckle. </p><p> </p><p>It makes her mouth water, even if all moisture travels south. </p><p> </p><p>"Morning, you." Kara reveals a small, grease-stained box from the bag. To her surprise, ice frost didn’t ruin the pastries after crossing the Atlantic at severe Mach extrapolations. "Someone in Champs-Élysées yelled <em> merde </em>at me like three times after I bought the last coffee eclairs. I’m thankful I picked some french from you or I would have said good afternoon right back," she says, chuckling. A paper cup is placed next to the keyboard Lena is currently stabbing. "Your cappuccino, straight out of Pavé."</p><p> </p><p>"Thank you." It's clipped. Not much to swoon over, but plenty to overanalyze.</p><p> </p><p>Kara wishes she could linger and ask silly questions like before if only to elate exasperated smiles from her, she’s dying to find the perfect words to smooth out the grimace marring Lena’s pretty face but her thesaurus seems to have perished, its <em> L </em> section gone with it.</p><p> </p><p>The wound has yet to stop burning red, and she doesn't trust her ability to appease Lena’s distress, so she just takes her word and steps away.</p><p> </p><p>Drinks half sipped, Nia is the objective of their attention as she shifts, asleep on her stool. And Alex has warned Kara hundreds of times that she shouldn't rush to pull someone out of REM reels, but years of being betrayed in the middle of the night by her own midnight monsters makes her heart race with antsy agony.</p><p> </p><p>"I saw them, but I… it was blurry," Nia says once she shots up-right, breathing hard. The dark circles under her eyes are more prominent than they were the night before. "There were rows of capsules– like oxygen chambers? This place is familiar.”</p><p> </p><p>"Lockwood’s Steel Factory?" Kara asks, cupping her hip while the empty hand reaches for her hair, tucking a lock of now-too-long bangs behind her ear. "Those were the capsules Ben used when he was holding Lena and Coville hostage in–" her lips sew close, and she walks the wise path of ignoring Lena, standing next to her, when she looks at her with perplexity written all over her face.</p><p> </p><p>There are some times when Kara forgets Lena is still unfamiliar with the most important pieces of their panoramic puzzle.</p><p> </p><p>"No," J'onn intervenes, arms folded over the heavy armor of his own suit. "That’s Amertek’s energy refinery, where we stopped the launch of Claymore against Argo."</p><p> </p><p>At the mention of that particular wraith, Kara halts in record time as she realizes where her hand is headed. Physical contact is a far concept and she doesn’t know if it’s allowed, so she will let Lena make that decision for them. It’s only fair. But she still tries to make her comfortable by leaning her body towards her.</p><p> </p><p>Not knowing where they stand sucks.</p><p> </p><p>She finds Alex, Kelly and M'gann staring at her when her eyes wander up. Her throat stings as she clears it. "Shelley Island? I'll head there, there's a chance I can find them.”</p><p> </p><p>"It's too dangerous," Nia warns, "we have no idea if Lex has upped security since then.”</p><p> </p><p>"It wouldn't be the first time the odds of dying on that island are against me." Kara shrugs, the newcomers go wide eyed. Damned be the missing pieces. "Oh! No– it was just a warm-up drill, nothing new. In fact, your brother got me out of there, perfect timing," she speaks to Kelly.</p><p> </p><p>"Do you even know the way in?"</p><p> </p><p>Nia’s question is clear, crystal and concise in its delivery. The answer... not so much. </p><p> </p><p>She knows, or at least can feel, the familiarity of this place. Were she there, the ins and outs would come without a hitch, but the knowledge doesn’t belong to her, the images in her mind are alien to Kara.</p><p> </p><p>Then the fog clears up. </p><p> </p><p>"I guess I don’t, but Red Daughter did.” Kara deflates. Her sister pulls her out of her self-absorption by pulling her into a lighthearted hug around her shoulders. </p><p> </p><p>"Dreamer, who's there with him?" Alex demands.</p><p> </p><p>"A tall woman. Narcissa Malfoy vibes."</p><p> </p><p>She hates that it takes her by surprise.</p><p> </p><p>Lillian Luthor is a plague she struggles to keep Lena away from, but Kara has the sneaky suspicion that before that damned crisis wiped out their efforts and rose Lex from the dead, Lena and the evil matriarch were two signatures away from the ceasefire. </p><p> </p><p>But it's oh so, <em> so </em> hard to detach someone from their nature if it’s their roots that are rotten.</p><p> </p><p>Kara hates that it’s Lena who has to take the punch to the gut, to endure the misfortunes of getting a cursed second chance.</p><p> </p><p>"Lillian, of course it's her," Lena finally speaks, "I should have known Lex wouldn't dare plan world domination without mommy dearest.” The pout that follows her words is quite distracting.</p><p> </p><p>”Let’s split up, then.” Alex nods. “Kelly, Dreamer and M'gann are coming with me to Leviathan’s ship. Kara, J'onn and Lena, Amertek is all yours."</p><p> </p><p>"No. Lena goes with you." Shoulders taut and chin raised high, Kara utters the words, leaving no room for further discussion. </p><p> </p><p>The last thing she wants at the moment is for Lena to have to face her family. </p><p> </p><p>It’s not that Kara fears she will bail and leave them stranded. She trusts Lena and, so far, she’s come through. But that hideous duo isn’t acquainted with any kind of guilt—they don’t have a conscience which remorse could eat away at if Lena were to get hurt.</p><p> </p><p>And if something were to happen to her... the bare thought makes her temples throb, like a screw that has been tightened too many times. It's rocks and glass in her throat as she tries to digest it.</p><p> </p><p>"This is a fact-finding mission, Kara. We won’t be facing the big, bald guy yet."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, but Brainy used the Shrink Code with Leviathan. There's probably no one at the ship, what with Gamemnae–" she employs her hands for emphasis–"going boom.”</p><p> </p><p>M'gann raises to her feet and walks over to them. "Security protocols must be on. When we got him out of there, it took J'onn and me days to get back our strength."</p><p> </p><p>"And Brainy is still recovering," Kelly reminds them. It’s impossible to forget.</p><p> </p><p>After the sacrifice attempt from his side, the Martians managed to breach the cloaking tech and rescue Brainy's inert body just in time. When they brought him to the lab, it took Lena and Alex a blink of an eye to link his inhibitors to an EEG through electrodes to record his brain activity. But mornings, days and late nights of research have brought no improvements to the table.</p><p> </p><p>Nothing seems to work.</p><p> </p><p>Brainy meant well when he made the sentient choice to work with Lex, even if his methods weren’t his finest repertoire. </p><p> </p><p>But that’s the thing. </p><p> </p><p>It has been a year of trying when the sun burns and failing when the moon soothes, for all of them. They have been careless, made easy mistakes siphoned from fear, it’s noticeable in the way there’s a severe ridge poking its dirty claws into the tender wounds they managed to open—some deeper than others—and riving the quaint, little family. </p><p> </p><p>In the same lines of messing things up by own accord, the impulse to be better and break through destructive patterns is greater than everything they know, and Brainy found a way to help them and trick Lex at the same time. </p><p> </p><p>And even if there is hope waiting for them on the other side, consequences affix Brainy, unconscious on a stretcher and Kara sees the exact second Lena and Nia sync and look down, guilt blinding their features.</p><p> </p><p>"It's still safer," she retorts, "Lex has the Element Benders at the snap of a bottle, and we're rendered powerless on the island. If something happens there, I won't– we won't be able to protect Lena. If she comes with you instead, she can find a way to counteract the radiation from the shield.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara makes nothing out of the knowing look Nia and Alex share. There’s no universe where she doesn’t put the safety of the people she loves first. It isn’t unexpected. Why would they act as if it was?</p><p> </p><p>"Lena's here, and she has a vote," she avows for herself, "but I agree. I've seen my brother use an anti-radiation pin with the symbol of Leviathan on it, I assume they gave it to him before he pulled a Lex-esque stratagem and betrayed them. I built this… just in case." Lena bends down to retrieve a metal box, gently removes the lid and takes another step to hand it over. Kara sucks on a breath as the light brush of a hand against her abdomen sends an erratic alert to her brain. Crimson clouds hover on their cheeks at the graze of nervous fingers.</p><p> </p><p>Kara’s always known her best friend is beautiful; something out of Baroque, evoking in its dark dramatism and yet so effortlessly captivating—but that’s just her friendly bid. And now, her heart skyrockets into an erratic thumping whenever Lena gets close, words hitch in her throat if forest green drills certain looks in a certain way, and Kara has to reign it in before the speed of her trembling fingers sends them flying. It’s rather… new, but no bother at all. </p><p> </p><p>She’s only wondering where it comes from.</p><p> </p><p>Perhaps it's the contrast between the lack of apprehension when they first met and the fact that Kara has no idea how to handle the recent development of almost going back to being strangers—not knowing what’s right or wrong in this new game of push and pull. She is walking on eggshells, and fears the first crack will take them back to square one. </p><p> </p><p>Their own warpath cracked the bricks of their foundation, leaving them unsteady and fighting to gain back some sense of balance in the turmoil. A domino effect of cosmic scales that was hindered before they joined Icarus in the destruction of their own wings. </p><p> </p><p>It’s like all the layers they have yet to peel will come back stained with some brand new revelations when they eventually dive into the exhaustive study of their friendship. Like, now that they flew too close to the sun and decided that stepping into the daylight was a wiser idea, the lens will magnify its reflection and answers are going to glare back at them in the silhouette of some long awaited cognizance…</p><p> </p><p>Kara can’t figure it out.</p><p> </p><p>"What's this thingy, again?" Kara rushes, out of breath. </p><p> </p><p>"It'll collect all written code from devices powered by any form of energy within a mile ratio. Attach it to a straight surface if Lex is nearby and press the button until the blue light comes on,” she elaborates, glued to her side. “When you bring it back to me, I'll isolate the pin's data and use it for duplication.”</p><p> </p><p>It's wildly embarrassing when Alex has to tap Kara’s chin lest she dislodges her slack jaw.</p><p> </p><p>Odds seem to be laden with Lex’s proud display of the upper hand right now. There’s no exact goal, they don’t even know what they’re looking for. It’s digging for air and answers to questions that haven't been asked yet. But Kara’s the first to stand up; a beacon of hope amidst the sea of doubt.</p><p> </p><p>Nia sends them off with a speech, troubled farewells and an unspoken pleading for them to find something. Anything would work.  </p><p> </p><p>Through a maze of seats, the cape flutters behind Kara as she heads for the door. Tendrils of sacred heat stop her, and if the rush of blood is anything to go by, she bids it's Lena. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> "Be careful."  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>"Always am," she assures, a cocky smirk set firm in place. "Besides, I’m not leaving unshielded. It’s no every single day that a world saving genius makes you a suit.” Kara taps her chest twice, and it’s empty when her heart escapes to hang onto the exasperated smile Lena does offer her.</p><p> </p><p>"And I trust my technology. But this is Lex we're talking about, you never know what he's got up his sleeve.”</p><p> </p><p>If there's a reason apart from her innate courage that Kara is taking the leap head first, it's she doesn’t fear what Lex might be capable of now that Lena has her back.</p><p> </p><p>"There's no need to worry, Ms. Luthor." J'onn approaches them. The pathetic whimper stays home after Lena drops her hand. "I'll take care of Supergirl when she inevitably runs into danger."</p><p> </p><p>That is a blatant misconception. Kara is known for her perfect plans. She follows every step and reaches impeccable excellence. It's not her fault if others can’t take the hint.</p><p> </p><p>The laughter that comes after a grumble is shy as she gazes at Lena again, promising that there is, really, no need to worry, that she is invulnerable after all.</p><p> </p><p>It’s impossible for her to notice the way Lena revels in anguish severe minutes after they leave.</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>By the time Kara returns, alone, the blanket of night has already obscured everything on andits path, and the lack of light input isn’t helping, making it impossible to feel the right turns if not for her increased vision. She paces, wearing holes in the concrete while she waits for a sign in the intricate path of hallways leading to Luthor Corp’s underground floors. </p><p> </p><p>In another life, Kara would have walked right in without reserves, waiting and toying with Lena's prototype of the week until she showed up with dinner and a stern warning to <em> leave that on the table if you want to keep your eyebrows </em></p><p> </p><p>But the past is the past, and it's useless to cry over spilt milk.</p><p> </p><p>She and J'onn found nothing. Shelley was devoid of Luthors or any device that would give them clues. Worst of all, the island did take away their powers, leaving them adrift with human–level strength and senses. Kara can still feel the strain on her leg muscles as she leans against a wall and waits, frustration has her swerving, chasing her own tail. </p><p> </p><p>Familiar, grounding heartbeats don’t take long to make the last turn to where she is stationed, thrilled when her eyes meet Lena’s, the rest of the team walking behind her. Lena consents as Kara gestures to the door.</p><p> </p><p>It's dark, and the room only comes to life when it reads their heat signatures. Nia shuffles to the far corner of the lab, where J'onn and M'gann assembled two hibernation chambers, and sits next to the one Brainy inhabits.</p><p> </p><p>"Where is J'onn?" M'gann asks.</p><p> </p><p>Kara swirls in her heels, blinking when she takes her eyes off Nia, crest-fallen as the ring of light above them punctuates her ex’s state. "He's buying us snacks, won’t take long.”</p><p> </p><p>It is Lena who, this time, pads across the room until she stands to Kara‘s side. A screen of faux serenity veneers the uneasiness, but Kara’s grown to be an expert in the field of twitching brows and lips and gives a soothing grin in the hopes of appeasing before they hover over the device on the desk as Lena quietly searches for solutions. "From what we saw there, I think that the Staff of the Shadow World works thanks to residual electromagnetic radiation from the cosmic microwave background. Rama Khan has been here since the beginning of time, so it wouldn’t be a surprise," she points out, the whisper carries an echo as it grazes the stilted silence.</p><p> </p><p>"If that is the case, the Staff probably powers the shield Brainy was exposed to,” M'gann suggests, standing guard by the door.</p><p> </p><p>Alex stares at the screens drilled into the wide post, tucked into herself as she reads the scans. A bucket of cold water drips down Kara’s back, the guilt tastes like sand in her mouth after not having noticed the state of unrest her sister is immersed in.</p><p> </p><p>"I ran all kinds of tests," she mumbles, fidgety, and her thumb goes to her eyebrow in an involuntary spam Kara hasn't seen in months. "There are no traces of radiation sickness, not even CRI from the exposure. No burns, no hair loss. Tissues and organs were not compromised, and the ionization didn’t reach his cells. His genetic material remains the same. How come he won’t just wake up?" her voice breaks when the last finger ticks off.</p><p> </p><p>There’s an all too common despair to her, and Kara’s heart swells when Lena sends a gentle curl of her lips in her direction. "Brainy is a synthetic being, health effects won't show up the way they do in humans.”</p><p> </p><p>"He comes from the future, I'm sure they know how to fix this. " Kara’s arms open, pointing to the med bay where Brainy is floating aimlessly in the cryo chamber. "But it's not like we can ask him."</p><p> </p><p>Were things different, were it anyone else in the world, Kara is sure that Brainy, along with Lena, would have figured out how to fix this by now. But he's not here, and Earth’s engineering—future or present—is a far cry from the science she mastered on Krypton.</p><p> </p><p>She is getting more frustrated by the second.</p><p> </p><p>"In the meantime, what we can do is brainstorm. Have you heard of the black hole information paradox? The theory of relativity says that the gravity of a black hole is so intense nothing can escape it, not even light. So, naturally, information that goes in would be irretrievably lost," Lena says, and Kara takes the tablet before she can stop her.</p><p> </p><p>Physics, she can work with.</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, and Hawking radiation basically says quantum information in a black hole may as well be destroyed. Not the most zealous stance," she snaps, regretting the moment the words leave her mouth when Lena nearly dislocates her neck to glare at her.</p><p> </p><p>The roll of her eyes is so acute that her sockets complain, and Kara’s pettiness fades into pitiness. </p><p> </p><p>Lena snatches the tablet from her hands and she doesn't know whether to be offended by the action or grateful because she no longer has to face the reality that her friend's life is hanging by a thread.</p><p> </p><p>"I'm taking a different approach here, Supergirl," Lena hisses. <em> That’s a low blow </em>. "There's a postulated solution proposing that information is out of sight, but remains encoded in the event horizon.”</p><p> </p><p>"So, my ex is a space balloon," Nia says, a new addition to the discussion.</p><p> </p><p>Kara doesn't have it in her heart to smother the laugh that bubbles up out of her, and is rewarded by equivalent awkward sounds .</p><p> </p><p>"We induced Brainy into a coma when activity ceased. As a physical entity, he stopped working, all except his neural oscillations, but those have shown the same patterns for weeks," Lena insists, sighing. "Right now, he's an information system in a black hole, stuck in the space-time boundary.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara raises herself onto the tips of her boots, floating an inch off the ground so she can get a glimpse of the device Lena is holding. Wide eyed, her heart races with the first tendrils of understanding weaving into her synapses. </p><p> </p><p>"If the source of radiation in the ship is the same as on the Staff, when Brainy used the code–"</p><p> </p><p>"He knew that the exposure could kill him, and thus, manipulated the code so that it would also capture him in the bottle. Mind and soul, Brainy is trapped with Leviathan."</p><p> </p><p>It dawns on them like drops of acid rain.</p><p> </p><p>The area designated for the med bay is rather large, placing the chambers into two equal-sized rectangles, and Kelly appears through the slats of distance between them, features distorted on the other side of the glass. She saunters over to Alex and rests a hand on her nape, kneading the knots there, before wrapping it around her waist. Alex sighs and leans into the touch. </p><p> </p><p>"If we get the bottle, we get Brainy back?" Kelly asks Lena.</p><p> </p><p>"In part, yes. But it’s not that easy. There are no other universes to jump into anymore, so he must be stuck in a dimension of his own making. A loop, any place in the world his mind concocted to make him feel safe.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara has been there. She's been through dream worlds more times than should be acceptable. The helplessness of not knowing what is real and what is not, what is just a cruel figment of her imagination and what will be there when she opens her eyes from the astral journey... living in self-designed alternatives is not as pretty as it sounds. </p><p> </p><p>Alex voices what Kara’s thinking. "We have to get him out of there before he gets attached to it.”</p><p> </p><p>"I'll do it. Whatever it takes." Nia raises to her feet and stops as she reaches the round table, smiling as Kara grabs her shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>"I understand you want to, I do. But you are half human, the risk is still too great,” Lena says.</p><p> </p><p>"This is like when Reign put you in a coma. All-over-again." Alex growls, looking at Kara.</p><p> </p><p>Oh, yeah. That was a nasty one. </p><p> </p><p>She sees the five seconds it takes Lena to suck in a ragged breath, stand taut as a willow tree trunk and put on the mask when the picture is seared into her mind without any warning. Sees the exact moment the dots connect to form a stark truth.</p><p> </p><p>"It's only fair that I do it," Kara urges, then, raking a hand through her hair. She would have to ask Alex to cut it soon. "But Brainy is trained in 31st century psychotherapy, how can I compete when all I have are my sappy pep talks?”</p><p> </p><p>"Don't sell yourself short, you brought half of humanity out of a virtual reality.” Kelly laughs when Kara blushes due the praise. “When the time comes, I'll guide you. I happen to have plenty of experience in bringing people out of alternate realities, too." </p><p> </p><p>"Well, let’s get Brainy back.” It’s Nia who sets the stone.</p><p> </p><p>Minutes later, J'onn walks through the door with crinkled eyes when M'gann, who hadn't left the door to make sure he came back, offers to relieve him from some of the bags in his hands. He pivots, the smile on his face turning downward when the atmosphere seems to wash over him. "Did I miss something?"</p><p> </p><p>While M'gann explains to J’onn what they discussed during his absence, Kelly and Alex huddle in a corner, whispering soft assurances, and Nia is once again glued to her chair in front of Brainy. The role assignment, the awkward comparison, bugs Kara as she makes her own way to Lena.</p><p> </p><p>"Hey." She greets with a smile that bursts into a star when she’s rewarded with a smaller one. "You did an amazing job there. We couldn't have done this without you.”</p><p> </p><p>She crosses her arms over her chest and lowers her head, before looking straight ahead. "I've been cooped up down here for too long, getting life advice from no other than Lex… is weird that I missed this? I just wish it was under better circumstances.”</p><p> </p><p>"What do you mean?"</p><p> </p><p>"Kara, don’t get me wrong but I don't trust anyone in this room but you, and that's something we still have to work on."</p><p> </p><p>
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</p><p> </p><p>"We'll stop them, we have to." Kara sighs, not daring to take a glance at her. "I've been meaning to ask you, do you think Lex knows that you and I are–"</p><p> </p><p>"No, I've made sure of it. But it’s good to take preventive measures, that's why–" her hands twist in the air–"this whole scheme. Better safe than sorry, you never know who might snitch.”</p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry The Tower is not fit for this. I've wanted to show it to you, it's <em> the </em>coolest place."</p><p> </p><p>"I’m sure the day will come.”</p><p> </p><p>That’s the only thing that keeps her going.</p><p> </p><p>"Is your apartment safe?" Kara blurts out, not knowing which way to turn, but aware that she doesn't want this conversation to end. "I mean, they know where you live and– well… you always seem to have a target on your back."</p><p> </p><p>"I have the most intricate security system in the world, and a Super is my security detail, I think I'll manage," Lena taunts, cute and overconfident. The gleam in her eyes below the septic light is ethereal and her whole face smiles, bringing a little bit of life back to Kara. </p><p> </p><p>Her fingertips tingle with the longing to touch Lena's. "Ha, you sure? I land on your balcony whenever I feel like it and I’m still in one piece,” she brags, but shuts up when Lena fixes her with an obvious look. "<em> Oh </em>."</p><p> </p><p>"You are the only one who uses the balcony as an entrance. To be honest, I think it was me always leaving the door open expecting you to… I don’t know, come back, I guess."</p><p> </p><p>It's a confession intended to make amends on a familiar subject, there is no hidden agenda, and she knows it. </p><p> </p><p>She can’t quiet down the violent flips of her stomach.</p><p> </p><p>The opportunity to hog the balcony as many times as possible was presented and taken, but she never dared to take a step past the glass doors, afraid that if she did, if she crossed that invisible border and broke into Lena’s sanctuary, Lena would have changed her mind and decided she never wanted to see her again the next time Kara landed on ashen tiles. </p><p> </p><p>Then, when it actually happened, it was Kara who took it upon herself to dig deeper into her own ditch.</p><p> </p><p>"I did, and called you a villain.” </p><p> </p><p>"It's okay, you weren’t far away from the truth."</p><p> </p><p>Kara takes half a step closer, only because there’s no more room to cover. "You know that’s not true. I was an idiot and shouldn’t have said that, but I was <em> so </em>hurt and Mxyzptlk offered to–"</p><p> </p><p>"Mxy– <em> what? </em> " there's the urge to pepper her puckered brows with kisses and Kara gulps it down because <em> where does that keep coming from? </em></p><p> </p><p>"Mxyzptlk. It's a long story, and when this is all over, I swear I will give you answers. We made mistakes, Lena, but there's nothing I want more than to make it up to you.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena nods, looking at her. "When the time’s right."</p><p>
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</p><p>It takes them a couple weeks to come up with something; planning and drafting until their next move is crystal clear.</p><p> </p><p>Pretty simple, in fact. Established in five calculated steps that were studied to exhaustion.</p><p> </p><p>Take the team to Shelley Island. Turn off the rods that dampen their powers. Get to the Luthors–Probably fight the least likable Luthor–Find out what to do with the Luthors once detained. Make it out in one piece. It's a hasty summary, and she's sure she's forgetting something, but it’s easy, almost like taking candy from a baby—if she were the kind of person who would do that.</p><p> </p><p>She has been Earth’s champion for half a decade; has faced any number of villains whose only goal is to wipe her off the face of the planet, fought family members, Daxamites, Worldkillers, and stopped more than one crisis doomed to let humanity spiral into cataclysm. </p><p> </p><p>Lex Luthor is not so different. </p><p> </p><p>She knows, no matter the outcome, the conclusion of this confrontation will leave an imprint that she will carry with her for the rest of her long life. It’s a necessary evil.</p><p> </p><p>She lived it once before, thinking that she had truly freed the world from that egomaniacal burden, but the truth exploded in her face, and she is still picking shrapnels from her ribcage. </p><p> </p><p>It is only fair that she gets to rejoice in the chance of seeing his face twist in fury as he realizes that he has been defeated. </p><p> </p><p>But Kara is paralyzed by fear.</p><p> </p><p>Her mind is trained against hat. She dons the red mantle with the intention of defending her new home from anyone who means it harm, with the intention of waking up every day and doing everything in her hands to preserve the second chance she has been given.</p><p> </p><p>And yet...</p><p> </p><p>This bites close to raw flesh that is too sensitive to touch.</p><p> </p><p>If things go wrong, if they don't succeed in defeating Lex first shot, there is a chance that his vendetta gets worse, fueled by the typical wrath and the lack of an element of surprise. And as much as she hates him for turning a bloodshed that he and her cousin started into a war between her and her best friend, Lex knows her pretty well and knows what her Achilles' heel is.</p><p> </p><p>Her loved ones. Even more so, his sister.</p><p> </p><p>Lena would be the first one he'd turn to if Kara didn't meet her goal.</p><p> </p><p>"Are you okay?" Lena asks, cradling Kara’s strong jaw to set the earpiece in place, grunting when a golden lock interrupts the task a second time.</p><p> </p><p>Divulging that there is an imminent fear of losing her again, denting and cracking until she’s gasping for air sounds too heavy for the early hour, so she settles for a, "peachy. Can't wait to get this over with, I feel like a soldier drafted off to war.”</p><p> </p><p>"And what does that make me? A soldier, too? I’m afraid I’m not really into camo prints."</p><p> </p><p>"Nah. You’re the best pal whom I share a matchbox flat with and fusses over me risking my life for our homeland.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena curves an eyebrow. "Would I send you letters?"</p><p> </p><p>"Oh, hundreds of them! Everyone in camp would be <em> so </em>jealous," Kara gloats, bending down so Lena can reach her face without straining. "You would tell me how potstickers are boring without me there to give professional insight, how furious you get when you find out the cactus I left on our windowsill is fake, but it’s okay ‘cause it still seems to be hopefully looking up for my arrival... and if that traffic light in Hope Street is fixed. You definitely have to write to me when Mrs. Stein's dog finally has puppies, I’ve been waiting for that one."</p><p> </p><p>It may be an effect of the harsh lights, or the elation she gets from the proximity. But Lena’s eyes twinkle and Kara has just made the moment much deeper than originally thought.</p><p> </p><p>"You don't even have a cactus."</p><p> </p><p>"I'll see to it that we have one before I part. There’s no excuse, Lena Luthor," Kara faux admonishes.</p><p> </p><p>The thing about laughs is that they are supposed to fill with joy and heal with its connotations, but the happy sound that comes from Lena tears Kara apart before it actually sets her whole again. It’s always been beautiful, a gift only a few get to be presented with, and Kara takes big pride that she’s privy to it.</p><p> </p><p>She hopes Lena doesn’t realise it is also the reason her heart skips so many beats.</p><p> </p><p>"I need to tell you something."</p><p> </p><p>"Hmm?" Kara looks down, dumbfounded with Lena's hands now on her chest as she tries to incorporate the nanite version of the anti-kryptonite suit.</p><p> </p><p>Before Lena can utter her confession, a dense noise heralds the arrival of a shadow that quickly turns into a black nebula, twisting and turning until its wisps extinguish in a humanoid shape, recognizable before her eyes. </p><p> </p><p>It’s the hand on her chest the only obstacle that prevents her from going on a hunt. Alex and J'onn also stand up, alert.</p><p> </p><p>"What are you doing here?" Kara growls, low and dangerous, and tightens her fists on her sides.</p><p> </p><p>Andrea, dressed in her amateur suit, stalks around the room as if it belongs to her, wearing the mask like medals that leave her a rank above Kara. The way she looks at her makes her stomach churn, fiery flames licking up her ribcage.</p><p> </p><p>"I see you haven't told them."</p><p> </p><p>She turns her head to Lena, but doesn't take her eyes off the intruder. "What is she talking about?"</p><p> </p><p>"She is willing to join us. Leviathan and Lex have both taken so much from her, and she’s more acquainted with Leviathan than we are, the intel could come in handy."</p><p> </p><p>"The Shadow willing to help, sounds fake. What do you want for this?"</p><p> </p><p>"Your identity," Andrea says, straight to the point.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> The nerve this woman has.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Kara feigns a laugh, exhaling and adopting an expression of disbelief. "Excuse me?"</p><p> </p><p>If she's privy to the knowledge of The Shadow’s identity, it's because she overheard Lena say her name while Kara was stuck in the Worldwide Unity Festival and connected the dots, realising how close they seemed to be after Lena mentioned her for the first time in her office. But Kara has no idea who this is, and if she doesn't trust her civilian alter ego, she won't trust the assassin who would have impaled her if it weren't for Lena.</p><p> </p><p>And, again, she remembers that Lena didn’t hesitate to be the only barrier between her life and a death at the hands of Andrea. </p><p> </p><p>Maybe it's only fair that she does it, too, even if it's only part of her life she’s giving up.</p><p> </p><p>"Do you trust her?" Kara mimics Lena's nod, and nods again, harder. "Do you think I should trust her?"</p><p> </p><p>"She's a good person, Kara," Lena whispers, "everything she's done is to take care of her family and legacy. It's not different from what we do here, don't you think? Besides, I wouldn't put you in this position if I knew she could hurt you, I learnt my lesson."</p><p> </p><p>With the promise of Andrea becoming part of the team, a new asset in the mission to defeat Lex, Kara knows that trusting Lena, even before it all went downhill, has never brought her any trouble. It is that thought, and hopeful green eyes set on her, that lead her to take the plunge and cross the barrier.</p><p> </p><p>"I’m Supergirl, but you also know me as Kara Danvers, CatCo’s reporter." Clasping their hands together feels oddly cathartic, as if by doing this, indirectly trusting Lena with her secret, she can redeem herself for not having done it sooner.</p><p> </p><p>Lena understands it that way, too.</p><p> </p><p>"I knew it! I knew there was a reason you didn't give me the scoop when you had the chance," she accuses Lena. The incredulous <em> what? </em> is on the tip of her tongue, but Kara prefers to swallow it and leave it to be discussed later. "It was ridiculous to see you so peeved over an ordinary journalist, you always pick powerful people off the menu, were you running out of options?" she turns to Kara, squeezing her hand. "Andrea Rojas, but you already knew that. And it's Acrata, not The Shadow."</p><p> </p><p>If Kara is intimidated by the inch of height difference Andrea has on her—that's only because the boots on her new suit have shorter heels for... aerodynamics—she doesn't show it, and no one notices. Except Alex, who shoots a questioning eyebrow at her, and Lena, who is only looking at her, but she always seems to read her lines without mistakes.</p><p> </p><p>"You were quite infatuated when this ordinary journalist was assigned as your bodyguard—exclamation point, exclamation point," Kara barks back, ignoring the gaze burning holes in her skull.</p><p> </p><p>Nia, perceiving the only-cut-with-a-sword kind of tension between them, takes on the task of explaining to Andrea every step of the plan, tearing apart every strategy and reminding her over and over again that teamwork is paramount this time. She gives her an earpiece and Andrea inserts it so easily and fast that Kara has to turn to Lena, wondering what took her so long.</p><p> </p><p>The answer never comes.</p><p> </p><p>"Time to go." Alex makes the call from across the room. "Kelly and Lena are in charge of comms, but you know the drill, if something comes up, divide and conquer."</p><p> </p><p>Lena looks in conflict with herself, biting the nail polish on her thumb until nothing is left. "I’m starting to think this is going to become tradition, but promise me you won't make any rash decisions.”</p><p> </p><p>"I won't, Scout's honor. Are you alright?" Kara wraps her hands around Lena’s arms.</p><p> </p><p>"Before, Supergirl was just a name and an emblem to be sad about for a few days if something happened to her. But now it's you, Kara. The person behind this crest, the most self-sacrificing hero I know, is the person I lo– I care about the most in the whole world. Now I can't be indifferent, and overlook if something happens to her because she is <em> you </em>.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara traces her thumb on Lena’s cheek, heart racing when long lashes flutter, and whispers, "I just got you back, do you really think you'll get rid of me that easily?" </p><p>
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</p><p>After that, everything goes to hell almost unbelievably fast. </p><p> </p><p>Kara feels guilty because she made a promise, but it's not like she wanted to get lost on purpose, that wasn't part of the plan. Being trapped alone with Andrea wasn't either.</p><p> </p><p>They had to stay behind while they looked for the power dampeners and their only mistake was not having noticed before that without paranormal advantages, the job would be a hundred times more difficult. </p><p> </p><p>The rest of the team took a different route, forced to go on hiding so as not to be detected by the security system that Lena and Kelly were working to breach. None of them know where the target is, but if they were smarter than Andrea and Kara, they must not be far from finding it, or them.</p><p> </p><p>The walls are high and thick in structure. not letting a sound through to indicate which direction they should take, and likewise, their earpieces aren’t working. They are essentially trapped in a maze of state-of-the-art technology pieces.</p><p> </p><p>"So... Lena," Andrea starts, leaning against a wall while Kara searches for a way out.</p><p> </p><p>"You need to elaborate on that."</p><p> </p><p>"She gave you a second chance.” She picks at her nails, trying to play down her words, but a wistful jealousy to them makes Kara stop where she summons pure adrenaline to climb, and pay attention. "I made a mistake when we were younger, and it took her almost ten years to forgive me. And I know it was because she needed something from me, I don't see what you can offer her in return.”</p><p> </p><p>"Lena is not an opportunist.”</p><p> </p><p>"But she uses her connections to her own advantage,” Andrea points out, “with you... she came back to you for reasons that I didn’t understand, but now are glaring obvious.”</p><p> </p><p>"What are those reasons?" </p><p> </p><p>"So sad you're guileless outside CatCo, too.”</p><p> </p><p>"You two, <em> behave. </em>” Alex's voice crackling through the comms feels like finally finding a needle in a haystack, in a minefield.</p><p> </p><p>"Hey! We lost you for a sec, where are you?" Kara drops the wall where her average strength failed to make even the slightest indentation, and shakes her hands to get rid of the debris in her palms.</p><p> </p><p>"Outside. M'gann is trying to turn off the dampeners. That was <em> your </em>task." She was in such a hurry to get Andrea off her back that she didn’t even survey their surroundings before jumping into danger. "Where are you? It's a setback mission the moment we raise the shield."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah... about that, I have no idea," Kara says and grimaces, waiting for her sister's disappointed sigh. "We saw an open door and well, that had to mean something, right? So we went inside, but this place is big and without our powers I couldn't find a way out sooner. And neither Lena nor Kelly are responding.”</p><p> </p><p>"We lost communication minutes ago. Apparently Lex was waiting for us and cut off signal prior arrival."</p><p> </p><p>An ice grip strangles her ribs and leaves her frozen in place—Kara doesn’t feel when warm coats her body with extraterrestrial energy. She is only brought back to the moment when a high-pitched screech is perceived by her hearing, and she figures that surprise has been unveiled. Lex knows they are there.</p><p> </p><p>The modest sound turns into blaring alarms and red flashing lights that haunt the hallways with demonic blends. Kara and Andrea traverse aisle after aisle until they find sunlight through the slits of a cracked window, but before Kara can take a step and follow Acrata’s already fading shadow, searing pain spins her blood vessels with a sadistic shade of green and sends her to the ground in an agonizing fall.</p><p> </p><p>It was expected, the kryptonite attack, but it still takes her by surprise, panting until her hand contracts in a fervent impulse and she can activate the suit. </p><p> </p><p>Lex and Lillian must be closer than she thought.</p><p> </p><p>The minute it takes her to recover is one of the longest in her life, and it's the comforting embrace of Lena's thoughtfulness enveloping and shielding her, that prompts Kara to stand up and keep moving on.</p><p> </p><p>She has to squint to get used to the darkness provided by the tinted glass of her helmet, but she isn’t worried about finding her way, her subconscious handles it.</p><p> </p><p>"I've been expecting the parade of buffoons for weeks." Kara hears the mockery in Lex's voice. "It took a lot longer than originally conceived, are you losing your edge, Supergirl?"</p><p> </p><p>Hairs on her nape stand high, and she dodges the beam of green light that is aimed at her back just in time. She turns around to see him donning a war-machine with an air of superiority that contrasts gracefully with his fragile humanity. </p><p> </p><p>The exosuit is the same that Kara saw Lena tweak and twist to perfection in order to be prepared in case she was the one who had to jump to save the city. How the tangible epitome of both sides of morality can merge to form an azoic monster manipulated by a living one is as frightening as seeing Lex approach with rushed steps and what Kara can swear is a sardonic smile behind the mask covering his face.</p><p> </p><p>"You Supers think you're all-mighty, but drop on your knees at the mere sight of a little green," he says, and launches a fist to her side that she is quick to deflect. "You are no gods. You are just freaks who believe they can hold something over our heads because of your enhanced skills.” The second blow is aimed at her jaw and Kara steps out of its orbit before it reaches its goal. "You and your cousin should have exploded along with that wanky planet of yours." </p><p> </p><p>The next blow comes from Kara's hands, and the crash of the armour leaves a dent on the wall in the shape of the droid.</p><p> </p><p>She's filled with an anger that hasn't been allowed to surface for years, but the Luthors manage to lurk into her deepest emotions—either positive or the darkest of them all. </p><p> </p><p>Lex can't just talk about Krypton that way and get away with it. She's done.</p><p> </p><p>Laser beams hit her helmet and shoulder pads, making her stumble with a dangerous crack. Kara floats and comes back, hard with a heel to Lex's chest, knocking him down and keeping her foot there until it is used as leverage. She bends on her knees before hitting the ground, throwing a low kick at Lex's feet that he easily dodges, horizontal and ready to lunge at Kara in a brief but precise flight. </p><p> </p><p>The force of the collision sends them flying into another room through the broken concrete, debris raining on the floor as they do so with grunts. The lightness of her suit holds an advantage over his heavy shield, so she has plenty of time to plant an elbow on what she assumes are his ribs when he seizes her from the torso, trying to prevent her from taking a stand.</p><p> </p><p>Her heart is about to burst out of her throat, and she feels claustrophobic inside the tight walls of the damaged helmet, signs and numbers flashing as she gets beaten up—there's no sign of a friend to guide her through this. But at the same time, she doesn't want anyone to come and see her in her angriest element.</p><p> </p><p>Kara was okay with him being in prison, it didn't affect her in the least. Her cousin had already gotten rid of that threat before she revealed herself to the world as a hero. She had never taken a second look at this genocidal lunatic because it was simply none of her business.</p><p> </p><p>But then she met Lena, and the distant hatred that clouded her became a revulsion that set her blood on fire at the mere mention of his name. </p><p> </p><p>He had been her sister's guide back when she needed to walk through the foreign circles of hell, had been her rock as she grew up and learnt the cruel lengths of the world as she abandoned the innocence of her childhood. Still, Lex betrayed her and left her to her own fate, picking up pieces of her soul that scattered from snowy tree houses up to cold boardroom tiles, trampled on by the people who should have been by her side when doubt and self-flagellation instilled a grudge Lena hadn’t completely grown from. </p><p> </p><p>It became her business when she understood how the loss of her brother managed to crack Lena's first pieces. </p><p> </p><p>On the other hand, Lex did get her attention after that, too. When he trained Snowbird to become Red Daughter, and gave her hope and family before he snagged it out of reach, only to use and discard her time later, leaving Kara impregnated with a foreign essence after the sacrifice…</p><p> </p><p>She’s never hated anyone more.</p><p> </p><p>Kara is about to plunge the finishing uppercut when her senses center on a heartbeat and the blood rushes to her shaky feet. She's too distracted as she zeroes in on purple strands materializing Lena, who shoves the transmatter portal watch in her pocket and cuts the distance between her and Lillian with a stoic expression, to notice Lex raising to his feet, and it's too late for her to defend herself from the onslaught. The blow to her face is the last thing the helmet needs to crack open.</p><p> </p><p>She can't give credit to kryptonite for the shortness of breath, because she's sure her lungs are empty when she lets all the air out in a silent cry for help. There is only one airway in the shape of Lena's sorry eyes on her before Kara stops breathing altogether. </p><p> </p><p>"Ah, well. If it isn’t the nicest Luthor out of the bunch," Lex says, the snarl clear on his mouth as he lowers the mask. The demeaning compliment does nothing to assuage her anger. "Spending time with this disgusting piece of a roach has clearly eclipsed your acumen. Such a shame." He kicks Kara in the stomach, and sends her crashing into the wall.</p><p> </p><p>Kara doesn't dare let her lids droop just because of the glimmer of hope that flows into her when she sees Lena trying to step forward before being stopped by her mother, who takes the dagger Lena sneaks up to her.</p><p> </p><p>"I told you, Mother," Lex continues, "Lena here has licked Supergirl's boots since she moved to National City. She doesn’t have it on her to be a decent Luthor."</p><p> </p><p>It's Lena's way of flinching, hiding behind her hunched shoulders that instills waves of ardor, and Kara’s next move is all for her. </p><p> </p><p>She leans herself into her trembling hands, ignoring the howls of her muscles and bones, and manages to take Lex by surprise when she throws him to the ground and wraps her hands around his neck, pressing with the rage, hate and resentment that has built up inside her since Lex broke them apart and did his best to ruin their lives.</p><p> </p><p>Kara is Earth’s defender because her legacy required it, but she is Lena Luthor’s by choice, first and foremost.</p><p> </p><p>The anguished mentions of her name coming from Lena's lips fly over her head and she squeezes harder, rejoicing in the way the veins on Lex's neck and forehead throb.</p><p> </p><p>She has never felt such a state of rage before.</p><p> </p><p>Kara is about to cross a line that she will never be able to forget, but this is quickly withered when flashes of the tragic story of a millionaire pursuing his love, Nietzsche’s philosophy and Marx’s economy, evenings spent learning english and chess strategies—too many memories she’s been seeing but ignoring from months come out of nowhere, like a wrecking ball. There is a surge of love, a painful sense of betrayal and a feeling of sorrowful acquiescence at last.</p><p> </p><p><em> “Alex?” </em> it’s ashes in her mouth, and they both are surprised to hear it.</p><p> </p><p>It is that moment of weakness that allows Lex to strike a punch to her temple, the last nail in her coffin. </p><p> </p><p>She feels balmy blood trickling past her temples and ears, feels Lena run to her side to cradle her limp body between her arms, feels tears on her face—she has no idea whose they are—and she feels pain and ruthless fear because Kara <em> needs </em>more days on Earth to spend with Lena.</p><p> </p><p>“You promised me you’d be careful,” Lena sobs, lips glued to Kara’s hairline.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m not going anywhere. We have yet to live in a matchbox with our fake cactus.”</p><p> </p><p>Before the world and everything she knows turns stark white, Kara realises the step on their plan she was missing was to save Brainy, hereby, retrieving the bottle, and she’s been beaten to it when Lex slides it open and yellow tendrils start taking them away from this moment. Lillian, ashen-faced, approaches her son and sinks the kryptonite dagger in Lex's heaving shoulder blades, reaching the goal of a mission Kara couldn’t complete.</p><p> </p><p>She loses consciousness to the symbolic thud of Lex's body crumbling into nothingness.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. waking up somewhere else</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>they face the consequences of the battle, and are still tiptoeing around the elephant in the room. showing lena her favourite things about krypton only makes kara fall deeper in love, even if she doesn't know.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>tw: </p><p>blood, mentions of death</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>Kara awakens with a start, shadows of red creeping through the slits of her wary eyes.</p><p> </p><p>Fatigue is a veil for her unfocused perception. It is only when fingers splay on the mattress where she learned to do somersaults, and the canary colour of the walls that endured a good deal of scrawled nonsense loses its blurry edge, that a ghastly kind of terror crawls up her neck and the floor quakes when she plummets to her knees.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Argo. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The static scene playing on the other side of the window covering a significant section of her childhood room, translates into a picture of all her innermost longings held captive in a permanent instant film, and the pain is nails scraping her veins level of unbearable.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Argo was supposed to be gone. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Kara has experienced the loss of her planet more times than is socially acceptable. She watched it crumble to pieces from her pod on her journey to a new life, next was the rewind of its disintegration sponsored by a wave of cosmic despair that once again confiscated her hope of keeping this <em> one </em> thing a little longer. </p><p> </p><p>It is to relive the agonizing film with the ending that never plays in her favor, a coin toss that falls against her.</p><p> </p><p>The bedroom is all she can recall among the bruised folds of her memory. Her bed is suspended twenty inches from the floor, taking up too much space for Kara's compressed chest as she attempts to expand her lungs and recover what this unexpected scenery suddenly took away. In the far corner, on a shelf that she had to ask Kelex to reach, is the <em> Kryptoniad </em> copy her father gave her, and there’s a powerful desire to reach and feel the only tangible memory she has left of him.</p><p> </p><p>She doesn't get far. </p><p> </p><p>The walls seem to evade her with every step she takes, too far and away, as if the goal of grasping the scriptures is only in her imagination, and they run away from Kara to protect her from the moment she realizes her eyes are the only ones that can sense the object.</p><p> </p><p>The place where she was born and raised is the closest thing to a castle, a palace with its lustrous <em> boradium </em>infrastructure and the large, rich velvet curtains that cascade down the windows and tint the atmosphere with dark gradations where Rao used to spill its scarlet splendor.</p><p> </p><p>It’s big and it takes Kara almost ten wrong turns and trace back in her footsteps to walk out the revolving doors, the axis swallowing her up and spitting her out into the grasslands of a new known world, desolate and decaying.</p><p> </p><p>The building grows further away behind Kara, she stumbles through the landing pad and into the dense woods that lead to the moving forest of Argo. All blooms are withered, waned to a vain memory of what they used to be and hanging from a last glimmer of grace, hoping for someone to come and give them a kiss of life, or death. </p><p> </p><p>Broken twigs and high grass that almost reaches the height of the maroon mushrooms hinder her path, the steps she takes by pure instinct are not a safety net and Kara has to use her hands lest she get a blow of nature on her face. The saturated earth carves strange patterns under the bare soles of her cautious steps, and the lack of background sound from the windy orchestra of trees and singing flowers is eerie. </p><p> </p><p>Not knowing what is happening pushes her into a corner of helplessness that slowly gobbles her up. She doesn't know why the remnants of her old home sway under her feet, she doesn't know how to go back to her new one. She doesn't know where Lena is, or if she’s okay, and that's a thousand times worse than not knowing what kind of risk Kara's in. The last thing she remembers is almost killing Lex, Lillian doing it for her and eyes the color of the leaves she tries to dodge shedding tears of despair. </p><p> </p><p>Immersed in confusion, she waits for the moment comprehension makes a move and checks the nexus of this vision. </p><p> </p><p>Silence is as overwhelming as the ideas that begin to shape inside her treacherous mind, gathering heat from her nervous energy until it is enough to ignite the dry grass that rustles with her movement. And she is spiraling, descending in a whirlpool of unstable earth, when the air carries a familiar voice with it, the song of a nightingale, to her. </p><p> </p><p><em> "Kara!" </em> It's distant, and dripping the same trepidation that has bathed her since she bolted awake. <em> "Can anyone hear me?" </em> The voice is hoarse, and so she discovers it is not the first time it has shouted into the void.</p><p> </p><p>Snatched from the twisted web, Kara lunges into a sprint before she realizes what she is doing and the reminder that the red sun is the core of her ordinariness comes full force with rocks biting the soles of her feet. But the thread that binds her to Lena pulls without mercy, and Kara is an unstoppable force. She has no fixed course, only follows the echo of her call, hoping that it will be enough to find her. </p><p> </p><p>The idea of Lena being part of this beginning, of this feverish chimera that brings back with it pictures that were already fading from the scrapbook of her life, hadn’t crossed her mind. Knowing that, somehow, she is a written character in whatever this story is, makes her fear less.</p><p> </p><p>"Where are you?" she shouts, but the only answer is her erratic heartbeat and the forest twisting to make way for her. "Lena!”</p><p> </p><p>Kara runs and runs and cannot stop. Branches tear at her face and arms, but she doesn’t feel the attack in the midst of her commitment to find her source of hope. </p><p> </p><p>The lines of flora with humanoid figures expand, widening until they open up towards the fringes where she can see the Fire Falls far from the distance, and she spins on circles under the red afternoon as she tries to summon another call. </p><p> </p><p>She knows that what she heard isn’t a product of her dazed sanity.</p><p> </p><p>Then, she sees Lena from the other side of the falls, amazed and with her mouth agape, the flaming orange shadows framing the disbelief in her face. The thread gives a last spirited pull, and all the breath she was holding rushes out in a single wave that threatens to leave her empty, but the portrait of Lena admiring one of her favorite scenic wonders is enough to keep Kara in one piece.</p><p> </p><p><em> "Lena." </em> Resuming her race, she searches for a way to reach the other side, and after what she is sure will be scars on her feet, she is running towards Lena with open arms and a state of divergence between unease and peace that chases after her presence. </p><p> </p><p>Crashing into her, enveloping Lena in a tight caress around her waist, the angry tides die at the bay and the whispers in her head quiet down to celebrate that she is here, with her. </p><p> </p><p>The smell of her almond conditioner mixed with the pungent scent of the wilderness anchors Kara to the moment, not allowing her to fade and become one with the relief that floods her for fear that when she lets go, the woman in her arms will be gone, just an hallucination. She shudders as Lena ties the other end of the embrace and without hesitation, her hands rise to clasp behind Kara's neck. </p><p> </p><p>Although she is stepping on the holy ground of Argo City, is cradling Lena and experiencing the marvellous thrill of her heart pounding next to hers the only thing that finally makes her feel at home. </p><p> </p><p>“What the hell is this?" The calm in the question cannot be compared to what she heard mere minutes ago. Lena takes a step back, breathing hard as she holds Kara’s face and draws the outline of her cheekbone before pushing a stray lock of hair away from her eyes. "God, Kara, where have you been?"</p><p> </p><p>The first glimpses of pain emerge as the adrenaline starts to subside. "This is Argo– this... we are in Argo. I don't know–... I– I don’t know how we got here, but this is all that's left of Krypton.”</p><p> </p><p>As the words register, Lena stands right in front of her line of sight, wishing to protect Kara’s innocence from the harsh reality. "Are you okay?" Lena insists, tender and pleasant.</p><p> </p><p>Her head moves up and down in a frantic tandem. "I'm not so super here," she laughs, putting the act aside and exposing her vulnerability. "It might hurt just a teeny-tiny bit." Leaning into the touch, Kara lies to earn more of her impervious attention, just because she learnt the flair for the dramatic from the big leagues. </p><p> </p><p>"I'm glad you found me. This place is..."</p><p> </p><p>"Scary, I know. I used to hate the Falls when I was a kid, but they became my favorite place on the whole planet.” She realizes her hands are still wrapped around Lena, but if she isn’t complaining, Kara is no judge to execute her own punishment. "Where were you? I heard you and... honestly, I don’t know what’s going on."</p><p> </p><p>The puzzle was hers. Kara knew every edge and dent in the pieces, its positions and the way to fit the ones with injured ends. Now, the image has been distorted and the guide ripped apart. She has no idea how to put the pieces together.</p><p> </p><p>There had been the team, the stressful addition of Acrata, her almost homicidal mishap and Lex unleashing chaos, then nothing.</p><p> </p><p>"He caught us in the bottle–"</p><p> </p><p>“–what were you doing there?" Kara strains to maintain eye contact. "When Lex... you were there. You were supposed to stay with Kelly, what were you thinking?" </p><p> </p><p>The Fire Falls roar with wrath, evoking wails from the core piece that holds Argo up, and it’s enough to distract Kara from seeing Lena wrap her fingers around her wrist, preventing her from walking away. The touch is nice, but there are so many questions that she can't let it calm her nerves the way it would if allowed. </p><p> </p><p>"I knew what I was doing, there was no reason to worry." It is said with such unwavering confidence, Kara knows it’s an act. </p><p> </p><p>"You told <em> me </em> to be careful." Kara reprimands with an incredulous glare and uses her free hand to jab a finger at her own chest. "Then I see <em> you </em>coming out of that purple thing carrying a kryptonite dagger as if I was supposed to know. What was that?"</p><p> </p><p>"I was working with Lillian." The mumble manages to reach her without difficulty, all due to the silence of the dead forest and the sudden calm of the flames.</p><p> </p><p>Therein lies the resurrection of the enemy who drew the line that split them in two, resurfacing like poisoned blood in her veins before she uses the benefit of doubt to halt its journey. Kara rakes her fingers through her long hair, pinching the bridge of her nose while waiting for an explanation.</p><p> </p><p>"I went to her the night we figured out Brainy's whereabouts. We had a decent conversation and... somehow, I got her to see that the only thing Lex cares about more than himself is his unhealthy obsession with you and your cousin, and that he would turn his back on her the moment he no longer needed her. I managed to convince mom." Lena smiles and emerald green glimmers. This is a brand new entry in the album of expressions that Kara has been putting together for years: crooked and shy, but brimming with pride as she recites the tale of a maneuver that, lives ago, seemed impossible to put into action.</p><p> </p><p>The curl of her lips is an omen of redemption that Kara cannot stop. "Why didn't you tell me?"</p><p> </p><p>"Because I knew you would have rejected the idea, Kara. You would have stopped listening at the mention of kryptonite."</p><p> </p><p>Her eyes bulge. "Don’t you think I have reasons?"</p><p> </p><p>"Lillian was our chance at beating Lex. She was a pawn, and she gave us victory. It’s that easy."</p><p> </p><p>"Thanks for the vote of confidence," she says, rolling her eyes, “but if you were planning to kill Lex with something that can also kill <em> me </em>, a warning would’ve been nice.” The abrupt mention of his death sobers Lena up and Kara waits for the moment she sees her eyes glisten with sorrow and pain, but it never comes. Instead, there is peace shining down on her like the light of a new life, and Kara glances heavenward, thanking Rao for hearing her pleas for this fallen angel.</p><p> </p><p>"Let’s hope that he remains very dead and you remain very alive for the rest of this eternity.” Lena shrugs, her thumb rubbing circles in Kara’s inner wrist. "I haven't seen much yet, but Argo is beautiful.”</p><p> </p><p>The desire to refute her stance throbs, for the city has never been in worse condition, not even days before its end. But Kara is grateful for her intentions. </p><p> </p><p>"I have no idea how we ended up in this place, but I'll show you around when we find out what's going on.”</p><p> </p><p>She should be nervous, she should be a jitter mess because she is trapped in Argo and doesn't have the faintest idea how to get out of there alive. Kara doesn’t even know if her sister and friends made it out the island. </p><p> </p><p>But she is not. And it's only because she has someone to accompany her on this absurd adventure. If that someone happens to be Lena, it's a tranquilizer dart fired at the beast that seeks to possess her.</p><p> </p><p>Rao's glow has begun to diminish, warning of the arrival of the two moons, but it's easy to distinguish the spots of blood splashing the stones that cover the road home, and Kara hisses as she feels the consequences of her hasty race to Lena.</p><p> </p><p>Lena notices when she can no longer conceal the pain on her face, and stops to look at her. "Weren't you used to wearing shoes on Krypton?"</p><p> </p><p>"That was like the last thing I thought about when I woke up.” Kara laughs and lets out a deep sigh. "But I don't regret it. I didn't think there would even be a chance to look for you here, a few scratches are nothing.”</p><p> </p><p>"There's no place I could have gone. You could’ve… just walk."</p><p> </p><p>Once again, she’s lying, because Kara’s action had a reaction, and the force of impact wasn’t entirely one-sided. But she lets her get away with it when Lena places one hand on her shoulder as support to take off her semi-sensible shoes, leaving her inches below Kara. </p><p> </p><p>She’s wearing the silliest pizza socks Kara found for last year's Secret Santa.  </p><p> </p><p>It beats in her heart and hitches in her throat, and she can no longer stop the murky tide. "We don't have the same shoe size."</p><p> </p><p>Amused mirth dances in Lena’s eyes as she glances up to meet hers, paired with the smug curve of lips that are already beginning to lose their paint. "Kara, believe me when I say I’m aware of our anatomical–" she punctuates with a squeeze on muscle mountains bulging from her broad shoulder–"differences, but this is an attempt at empathy, I’m trying to level the playing field.”</p><p> </p><p>The way back home is an easy task, even after crossing the turning point where Kara first heard Lena and the tracks she had been following are lost. The newcomer walking beside her is as awash in childlike curiosity as she suspected she would be, Kara is beyond elation and happy to oblige, answering questions about the giant mushrooms and the dead forest that comes to life in a deplorable oxymoron as they conquer the way through the gravel road.</p><p> </p><p>As they cross the border between the woods and civilization, Lena gasps at the sight of the building erected in front of them, and Kara glances at her with blushing cheeks.</p><p> </p><p>"Is this your home?" </p><p> </p><p>"More like the place where I lived a small portion of my life," she says, scratching the back of her neck. "But yes, I lost my first tooth here, so I guess it's home material.”</p><p> </p><p>Without thinking, Kara stretches out her hand, and without hesitation, Lena takes it. </p><p> </p><p>Stepping into the building with their hands clasped feels oddly cathartic. Domestic, like the stupid earthly tradition of crossing thresholds with the bride in your arms. But Lena is not her bride. </p><p> </p><p>It's just a harmless thought. </p><p> </p><p>She is giddy, drunk on the wonder that Lena shows as she gapes at the tall, imposing crystal columns that support the foundations. There is a delicate layer of tenderness and apprehension in her as her fingers reach out to the engraved patterns on the walls, and Lena only plants her palm firmly on the navy metal after asking for permission with her gaze.</p><p> </p><p>"Kara, this place is... <em> wow </em>." </p><p> </p><p>There's also the overuse of her name, and she can't get enough of it coming out of her mouth after being called Supergirl for <em> so </em>long. It's a small saving grace that also enhances the prosperity of their relationship.</p><p> </p><p>It takes them a couple of minutes to walk down the main aisle, but when they do, Kara is overjoyed at the sight of a big door she remembers leads into the kitchen but the lack of food options on the shelves sink her excitement and Kelex is no prop in this scene to ask it to prepare something for them.</p><p> </p><p>"Are you hungry?"</p><p> </p><p>"Not really, you?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara tastes the question, and shakes her head. "I don't think so, I'm not sure. Will we even feel hunger?"</p><p> </p><p>They enter the kitchen anyway, guessing their next steps for long seconds until Kara finally finds the light pad and slides her hand in front of it, slowing down on her injured soles and choking in a howl before hitting the marble structure that begins to emerge from the floor when the lights come on. The tiles sink to form a perfect hexagon, and from the cavity rises a giant block of the same shape that she can now remember is the same piece of polished stone where she used to help Kelex bake for the festivals. The edges are still sharp, as the scratches and bruises that marked her when she used to run around could remember, and she has to dodge them unless she wants to raise the purple memory on her blemish-free torso. </p><p> </p><p>Pushing herself with the strength of her forearms, Kara sits on the surface, feet dangling as they hang adrift. Lena, on the other hand, finds a stool and places it adjacent to her. </p><p> </p><p>It’s bizarre. Time stopped and locked them in an extraterrestrial snowball, dreadful with its mystical setting. There is no way in or out. They woke up in this fateful scenario without any direction, without anyone to orchestrate their movements. Or give them a scene, at least. It is hanging from a script that neither of them has had the opportunity to study.</p><p> </p><p>"I have a vague idea about what this is," Lena divulges, following with her finger the abstract tendrils embossed in the marble. "When we were... awake, that's the word I'll use, when we were awake—remember we were trying to retrieve the bottle? Lex somehow managed to use the Shrink Code with you, but I guess proximity got me on the way, too."</p><p> </p><p>"I understand that this is the happy place that my mind made up for me." Kara points out, resting on the heels of her hands behind her back. "But why are you here? I'm not complaining, but..."</p><p> </p><p>"It must be my brother's work," she hastens to propose.</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, right." Turning her head in her direction, Kara laughs, disbelieving. "If there was anything he hated more than me, it was seeing <em> you </em>with me." </p><p> </p><p>"He hasn’t been so bad since the crisis."</p><p> </p><p>"You know that was just an act. He needed to put in the good boy shoes to convince a wistfully oblivious planet.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena looks down, leaning away to rest her weight on the back of the stool. "And I helped him do it.”</p><p> </p><p>"He was the most manipulative, abusive person in the world, Lena, but he was also the boy you grew up with.” She sucks on her teeth, and pulls at her earlobe. This is uncharted territory, and Kara hopes she covers it well. “It wasn't the right way, but you were hurt and acting out of anger.” Her words feel empty in the ricocheting of the high walls, disappearing like wisps of smoke, and she needs to add something else to reinforce her position. "Do not condemn yourself for one mistake after a hundred good actions. You have a heart of gold, that's what I chose to see. You should try it, too."</p><p> </p><p>Kara isn't looking at her, she doesn't dare, and that's why she doesn't notice when Lena’s hands twitch, her self-control about to go overboard in her quiet, toppling longing to touch her. </p><p> </p><p>"I think we'll feel hunger, if that's something you're worried about.” </p><p>
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</p><p>To see Lena sitting so peacefully in her bedroom is a probability she never thought would play in her favor. </p><p> </p><p>Of course, Kara has seen her sprawled out on her bed in National City, grunting and sleepy as she tries to hog the blankets, but this is nothing compared to it. </p><p> </p><p>She's on the edge of the bed, eyes zeroing on the panorama offered by the diaphanous <em> grahu </em>of the window. And Kara is used to having her breath stolen by the halo of moonlight sneaking through the window, hovering above Lena in the darkness of her apartment, but the light of Koron and Mithen rain down on her, and before her lungs start working again there are three midnight odes in the tip of Kara’s tongue.</p><p> </p><p>"There are two moons," Lena concedes, her scientific edge shining brighter than both satellites. </p><p> </p><p>"That one is Koron.” With her fingers gesturing to the larger one, she plops down on the mattress, leaving an appropriate feet of distance between them. "And the one furthest away is Mithen. We used to have four moons, but Xenon went out of orbit and Wegthorn was destroyed by a scientist."</p><p> </p><p>"So, evil transcends all boundaries of the trackable universe."</p><p> </p><p>"I'm afraid so." Kara sighs, a layer of nostalgia falling on her face. "I remember when it happened. Everyone was so distraught about the loss of one of our first colonies, but I was angry because they banned space flight and we couldn't use Dad's ship anymore.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena throws her head back in a swift snort, her shoulders shaking with silent laughter as she notices the guilty look on her face. "To be young and have the wrong priorities."</p><p> </p><p>Her response laughter is muted. Despite the grim confession, there is a small flame flickering, hands burning as she tries to keep the fire from fleeing. Kara remembers that week, remembers being weepy those six days because her parents went and came back, working harder in the midst of chaos, and she had to live with lullabies sung by robotic voices for long nights. Yet, it’s one of the few memories still alive in her mind, and she doesn't mind putting her hands in the fire if it means it will keep it there.</p><p> </p><p>She is brought back from her trance when Lena lets out a cute yawn and blushes, hiding behind her hands when Kara looks at her with a quirked eyebrow and a mocking grin.</p><p> </p><p>"Tired?"</p><p> </p><p>"Maybe," Lena responds, bags under her eyes more prominent now that her worn-out makeup no longer covers. "I spent hours wandering around looking for something.”</p><p> </p><p>She scowls. "How long had you been here?"</p><p> </p><p>"I woke up in a meadow, like, six-ish hours before you found me."</p><p> </p><p>"I thought... it's okay. Days here are a little bit longer." Standing up, Kara starts walking backwards, stopping three steps from the doorway. "You take my bed. I don't think I'm in the right condition to sleep in my parents' room so... I'll go get some sheets for the windowsill."</p><p> </p><p>"Kara, you don't have to."</p><p> </p><p>"This is my land, Lena, I must be an utmost perfect host." She smiles and is rewarded with a roll of pretty eyes.</p><p> </p><p>That's when the hard part begins.</p><p> </p><p>The first time, it took her a few minutes to find the stairway leading to the first floor, but the top floor is a completely different maze. Kara, for the love of all that is sacred, cannot place herself in the space. It widens into three hallways that open like a trident up from the main room, and closed doors splash the walls, no clue or special feature to highlight the room she is looking for. Doorknobs are tested and so is her patience when none of the doors give way.</p><p> </p><p>Kara has to remember. She lived in this place for a little bit less than half of her living… life. And it hasn't been that long since she was last here.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Why can't she remember where the damn room is? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The sounds of doors slamming close begin to come more often, harsh as the anger and helplessness begin to simmer inside her. She throws open door after door, afraid that the next time is when she encounters a white infinity that will be the tunnel that brings her back to the life she’s familiar with now. But that doesn't happen, and all she finds is a void that begins to fill the cracks with air and the serenity that is snatched from her.</p><p> </p><p>After Kara has gone through more than half of the second corridor, she leans over a wall, sliding until she hits the ground and bends her legs to hide her head between them. </p><p> </p><p>Be it stocked beddings and tablecloths the thing that drives her to her first breakdown.</p><p> </p><p>"Kara?" The echo reverberates through the long hallways, and showers her with a mixture of harmony and shame that she cannot shake. "Hey, what’s going on?" Lena kneels beside her, hand stroking up and down her shoulder blades.</p><p> </p><p>"I was born here–" she sobs, wiping her tears with the sleeve of her gown–"but I can hardly find my way here. It took me a small eternity to turn on the light in the kitchen and to find the main doors. This place is so big and I can't remember where things are.” </p><p> </p><p>"You’re tired and confused, and tomorrow will be a new day," Lena says, caressing the angry scratches on her arms, and offers her hand to help her stand up. "C’mon, let’s go to bed.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara didn’t think twice, and now she doesn’t know which hole she jumped into, until she sees Lena walking out of the dressing chambers donning a blue nightgown that is too long and hides her fists. She has to focus on the tattered, dirty edges of her own robe to control the flush that blossoms on her chest, along with the whirlwind of emotions that begins to play wicked games with her mind as she remembers she's going to share her childhood bed with someone else. With Lena, no less.</p><p> </p><p>She freshens up in a daze, and comes to her senses when the patterns on the ceiling above lose their meaning as the light sheet is removed by Lena's accord.</p><p> </p><p>They've done this hundreds of times. It’s not the reason her body is about to combust. </p><p> </p><p>"Good night." She isn’t aware who the tightness of throat belongs to, but when the well wishes don't get an answer soon, she realizes it's not hers.</p><p> </p><p>"Night, Lena."</p><p>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
  <br/>
</p><p>Kara awakens with a start, and missing the heat her bed partner's body emanates.</p><p> </p><p>The other side remains empty, but the scent of almond clings to the pillow and, suspiciously, to the suede that covers her shoulders, too. It’s proof that this is not a mirage of her imagination, this new reality is the most tangible thing she has at the moment.</p><p> </p><p>Statistics jotted down in the sizable mirror stare back at her after stepping out of the shower, forecasting that the day is destined to be baptized once more by Rao's beams of red light. </p><p> </p><p>The time it takes for her outfit to be ready, Kara spends tending to the abrasion on her feet, and the cuts that blight her cheeks and forearms, using the Rondor radiation capsule her father had built for childish accidents like that to heal yesterday's injuries. And as she watches the wounds stitch close, with the rebirth of unblemished skin, she dares to embrace the thought that comes next.</p><p> </p><p>It feels good to be here.</p><p> </p><p>She walks out of the chambers and she's still alone in the wide area of the bedroom. Panic begins to rise from the depths of her empty stomach as the possibility of Lena being gone with the arrival of morning crosses her mind. However, Kara doesn't have time to sink into her second breakdown in less than twenty-four hours, as she has to cease her march in order not to stumble upon the humanoid frame hidden behind a cloth tower.</p><p> </p><p>The laughter that seizes between her lips takes away the last reserve of air that used to inhabit her lungs, so she has to take a deep breath to utter her next words. "What are the odds that you’re okay behind this?" </p><p> </p><p>"I found the linen room." </p><p> </p><p>Indeed they are, stocked beddings and tablecloths are the defeating blow.</p><p> </p><p>"Ah.”</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah... you know my circadian clock keeps fucking me over, and I saw an opportunity to spend time doing something productive.”</p><p> </p><p>"Thank you."</p><p> </p><p>"It's nothing, really, I just–"</p><p> </p><p>"<em> Thank you, </em>" Kara interrupts her, boring into jade orbs.</p><p> </p><p>In an uncharacteristic Lena Luthor move, she gives up and lowers her gaze, letting Kara win the spontaneous staring contest. </p><p> </p><p>After leaving the tower of silk sheets on the surface of the bed, Lena turns around, stumbling backwards to notice Kara almost glued to her back. "Your face looks nice." She stops before reaching her goal, but the gears in her mind turn and she makes a decision, tracing her fingerprints on the patches of sun-kissed skin that, minutes before, were marred by nature's grudge. </p><p> </p><p>Kara sighs, and once again lets her head fall a few degrees until it fits the hands that hold it. "Nice? That’s all you’ve got? You’re lucky your face is kind of <em> nice </em>, too, because you’d be losing the game if it were up to your pick up lines.” She sighs again, deep, when Lena rolls her eyes but the gleam in them doesn’t dim.</p><p> </p><p>“I’m not playing games, I’ve already found what I want." </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> What’s that supposed to mean? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>“There’s this creature called Rondor, its horn emits healing radiation. I used it after taking a shower and I’m good as new."</p><p> </p><p>"Eventually, you will have to tell me about these magical creatures. But I'm dying to shower and I'm afraid I’m not smart enough for your bathroom.”</p><p> </p><p>"You can handle beings of twelve level intellect, but you draw the line at alien shower systems?"</p><p> </p><p>"That's how life goes.” It’s said with a nonchalant shrug and a cheeky smirk that Kara urges to wipe off her insanely <em> nice </em>face.  </p><p> </p><p>It seems that they brought pieces of their world to this alternative reality, and one of them makes an appearance in the form of her heart skipping beats that have already begun to get used to being overlooked when they feel Lena's presence nearby. She gulps, embracing the feeling with open arms and an open heart, even though she is still closed to the idea of studying its origin.</p><p> </p><p>Systems explained and directions given, she tries to erase the thought of Lena in her bathroom off her mind, and follows the sound of her stomach growling like a detector, leading her to the kitchen. </p><p> </p><p>There, she is pleasantly surprised to see the shelves full of food that wasn't there the night before, rows of vegetables and fruits that don't look or taste anything close to what she's used to now. Anyway, Kara prepares breakfast for two with suspicious hands, and pinches of intrigue about this new development. </p><p> </p><p>She is glaring holes into the omelette sizing in the pan, and that’s how Lena finds her when she enters the kitchen, her hair wavy as it dries without help.</p><p> </p><p>"What did the poor eggs do to deserve your anger?"</p><p> </p><p>"Last night... there was no food, right? Am I losing my mind?"</p><p> </p><p>"No," Lena supports her idea, sitting down in front of the spread of dishes she has served by now. "I think this place caters to our physiological needs and desires. I saw things today that weren't here yesterday."</p><p> </p><p>Kara purses her lips, and her fingers slide across the projected panel on the table surface, tracing a circumference that doesn't meet its end to diminish the boiling blue flame under the pan. "So, if by any chance I need to–"</p><p> </p><p>"Please don't finish that sentence.”</p><p> </p><p>"You don't even know what I was going to say!”</p><p> </p><p>"<em> So, if by chance I happen to need any greasy concoction I have in mind, I only have to think about it and it will come in a jiffy? </em>" The imitation is quite on point, but it is a secret that Kara will take to the grave with her.</p><p> </p><p>She laughs, throwing her head back and revealing the column of her neck, and floats above Lena after leaving her plate in front of her, resting her hip on the granite table. "My voice is not that high."</p><p> </p><p>Lena turns ninety degrees to the right, her knees bumping into Kara's toned thigh, and places an elbow on the marble counter. Too close. "I can go lower, Danvers.” She has no makeup on, but there is a healthy blush on her cheeks that Kara can only contribute to her natural complexion.</p><p> </p><p>"Enjoy."</p><p> </p><p>Her own breakfast is Lena’s times four, a thousand times more sugar than anything else. She chokes on bagels and jam that make her cheeks swell, chewing and swallowing with a sip of juice that is too sweet, but not enough to placate her saccharine palate.</p><p> </p><p>The sound of silverware crashing into porcelain is the only thing that pierces through the silence of the room, until Lena pushes her plate in her direction and she is happy to accept the offering.</p><p> </p><p>"I assumed that food on Krypton would be... different?”</p><p> </p><p>"Food comes from similar sources here and on Earth. Crops of vegetables, grains and fruits like any sustainable ecosystem. Yes, there are certain things here that we don’t have there and vice versa, but on a balance, it's pretty much the same.” </p><p> </p><p>"So, speaking of gastronomic settings, food wasn’t something you had to get used to when you landed there?”</p><p> </p><p>Kara taps the fork against the plate and straightens her back, humming. "Food has always been one of my biggest comforts, I don't know what would have happened if I had lost that too.”</p><p> </p><p>Pity is the last thing she wants Lena to feel, but the acrid confessions spill effortlessly out of her mouth, overflowing her with the fervor of a truth that has been struggling to be released for years. There is only one other person in the world with whom it is so easy for her to divulge facts from her previous life. And she would like to have Alex around to ask her advice about... whatever is going on.</p><p> </p><p>Many minutes have passed since she’s been staring into emerald eyes, and she would feel out of sorts if it weren't for the fact that Lena has kept her gaze for the same amount of time. She breaks the spell, guides her eyes down and bites her lip to tame the smile that threatens to tear her face muscles.</p><p> </p><p>"I knew from our first date that you had a good appetite," Lena says. Kara doesn't have the courage to add <em> lunch </em>to turn the meaning of that sentence one-eighty. "I'm glad my pocket can keep up with you."</p><p> </p><p>"Mom used to say I'm high maintenance.”</p><p> </p><p>"Sounds like a wise woman.”</p><p> </p><p>"She was.”</p><p> </p><p>"Let’s go, this conversation deserves to be had outside.” Lena has the honorable intention of taking their dishes to the sinks, but turns on her heels to see Kara snickering behind her. "I kind of understood the DJ mixer hologram that is supposed to be the stove, but where the hell is the dishwasher?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara slaps her palms on the marble and raises to her feet, laughing, cocky and gleefully at her friend's expense. </p><p> </p><p>"You're having a field day with this, aren't you?"</p><p> </p><p>She brackets Lena’s hips, fitting her solid front into warm curves in a too bold move for boldness she doesn’t feel. The deep, ragged breaths coursing to their lungs are melodramatic for an atmosphere where the rules of the game do not warn if air is necessary to keep playing. </p><p> </p><p>"Most things here don't need direct contact to work," she explains, twirling her hand to make a chart of alphanumeric characters emerge from the countertop and float as the wall parts to let the dishwasher out. "We were pretty dependent on robots to perform our basic chores.” She fits some dishes and silverware into the required compartments, showing Lena how to use the appliance.</p><p> </p><p>"No more than a day here and my wit has been restored to that of an infant.”</p><p> </p><p>"You're smart, you got this." Kara breathes down her neck, ever the optimistic, or the love-struck guardian angel. </p><p> </p><p>"As long as you are my Virgil, I think I’ll manage.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara exterminates the spell at its root, and decides that being too close to her is not an option as long as she is unaware of the origin of the sparks that stun her senses. She takes a step back, pulled by her consciousness and self-flagellation using its tight ropes on her.</p><p> </p><p>After a few hours, the afternoon begins to shape the parade of nature covering the forest they have to cross to get out of the suburbs where their temporary home stands. Kara, transfixed by the way her trousers cling to Lena's hips, takes them down the same path they took yesterday, with the only exception that she stops where treetops open up to offer the periphery of the sky glowing in crimson hues. Lena stands next to her, brushing her little finger with hers, and stretches her neck upward when Kara's arm suggests she do so.</p><p> </p><p>There is the cosmic wonder that is Rao's solar system, but a layer, however close it comes to being invisible, acts as a cloak between their eyes and the bare sight of the clouds and stars. </p><p> </p><p>“See that?" Kara asks. "It's Argo City’s dome, made of grahu—a type of material like plastic, but stronger, impenetrable. Windows back home are made of that, and there was a mall downtown built with it, it was amazing to see what people were doing without actually hav– wow, that sounds really stalkerish.” </p><p> </p><p>"A little bit."</p><p> </p><p>"But I don't think we'll find it in this... whatever this is."</p><p> </p><p>If this was all Lex's doing, Kara doesn't think he had the finesse to recreate an entire city to make her suffer. She trusts that he used the most heartbreaking parts of this land, her home and the places most significant to her, to lock her in a loop without limits. </p><p> </p><p>"Why is it there?"</p><p> </p><p>"Dad built it to protect the city," Kara confesses, swallowing the knot in her throat. "I guess, in part, he did. Argo was the only thing that survived the explosion."</p><p> </p><p>Lena stops brushing their fingers and goes for it, intertwining their hands together. "What was his name?"</p><p> </p><p>"Zor-El."</p><p> </p><p>"<em>Oh,</em> like you." There is a soft flush growing in her ears as Kara peers at her. "Lex has a lot of information about you and your family.”</p><p> </p><p>Well, of course.</p><p> </p><p>"Then it's my duty to properly introduce myself.” It’s awkward when she has to let go of Lena's right hand to take her left, but she shakes it with a firm grip and rocks Lena's world with one of the brightest smiles she's ever given someone. "My name is Kara Zor-El, and I belong to the House of El. I was born on Krypton many years ago, to Zor-El, a scientist, and Alura In-Zee, Alura Zor-El after marriage, she was something like a–"</p><p> </p><p>"–lawyer. You mentioned it once." </p><p> </p><p>"That's right.” It's heavy, it's <em> too </em> heavy, and the unshed tears block her airways.</p><p> </p><p>Long fingers trail the crest woven into the gown that Kara wears, and the touch scorches through the skin of her chest to make a home in the beating bone box, leaving a mark there. "It’s my pleasure to finally get to know Kara Zor-El." </p><p> </p><p>Her name in Lena’s mouth sounds beatific and strikes like lightning, Kara is willing to endure the shock if it means she can keep hearing it for a lifetime.</p><p> </p><p>"You already know me."</p><p> </p><p>"I do, but I’m dying to know more about this side of you."</p><p> </p><p>That's all she ever wanted to hear, and Lena is so beautiful... Kara just... </p><p> </p><p>She can’t take it.</p><p> </p><p>Biting the inside of her cheeks, Kara averts her eyes away from naked lips when a pink tongue darts out to wet them. She takes one step backwards, and then another two, and then she is making her way to a tree log where she takes a seat, facing the Fire Falls.</p><p> </p><p>"You met my mother," she begins, playing with the folded cloth on her bent knees. "With the Harun-El situation, and the whole thing with Sam.”</p><p> </p><p>"Right. She is so beautiful and so kind, I think I'm beginning to understand where you come from.” Lena sits down next to her, and starts doodling lines on Kara’s knee.</p><p> </p><p>"She <em> was</em>. I think after the crisis– I think she's gone." Her lower lip quivers, and there is a well known prickling sensation behind her eyes. </p><p> </p><p>"Tell me about her."</p><p> </p><p>It's an avalanche barreling through the barrier, with such force that Kara is willing to suffer the collision.</p><p> </p><p>"She was… I loved her so much. She was a great person and the best mother, everything I know about standing up for my ideals it’s because she taught me.” She lays her head on Lena's shoulder, and it feels so natural that she doesn't have the strength to keep questioning it. "My parents were always working, but there wasn't a morning when we didn't make pancakes, or nights when she didn't read bedtime stories for me. She made mistakes, I know, but there's nothing I wouldn't give to see her just one last time. When I found out Argo was still here– she was there and then... she wasn’t. My hopes were shattered when I lost her again.”</p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry for everything you've lost.”</p><p> </p><p>"I got some good things in return. I can't complain."</p><p> </p><p>"But that doesn't make your pain any less real or valid, Kara. You have the right to mourn and hurt sometimes, even if you are happy now.”</p><p> </p><p>"You make me happy," Kara mumbles and dives into a backtrack. "And my family, and my friends. You all make me so happy."</p><p> </p><p>A stentorian growl thunders in the deep cavity where flames flow and plunge in a free fall into the Fire Falls. The element, smoldering hot and almost turned to lava as it simmers in its landing, it’s the only source of light and heat that surrounds them now that Rao is gone and two new acquaintances enthusiastically approach to brighten the newcomers. </p><p> </p><p>The green in Lena's eyes is depleted by orange tones licking her pupils, and it is one of the most enchanting phenomena that Kara has seen in all the places she has been to. She leans closer so she can take a better look, and startles when Lena turns to her and now it’s mere inches that keep them as two separate beings. </p><p> </p><p>"Did you see that?" Lena asks, high-pitched.</p><p> </p><p>Kara’s perched ramrod straight on the log, feeling the exhaustion of the day and the strain of not knowing how to act starting to take its toll on her, and crack her neck to focus on whatever thing Lena wants her to see. She then manages to spot a slim-bodied creature crawling on the surface of the pit, its dark color standing out from the striking hues of the pool of hell, and grunts as she realises what it is.</p><p> </p><p>"That's a fish-snake, their bite is fatal," she says, and narrows her eyes, offended by the vision that comes sweeping through her hippocampus. "Those things bit me whenever I went out to play with my friends. Without exception. Every single time."</p><p> </p><p>"So you were born this way? I thought it was time that made you reckless." Her petite frame tries to rattle Kara's, and not even in otherworldly boundaries or alternative mind prisons she can make her move an inch.</p><p> </p><p>"Lena, if I have the cure, there's no reason to worry."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, but you won't always have a cure waiting for you at home, will you?" </p><p> </p><p>"What are you talking about?”</p><p> </p><p>"You're very confident that, no matter what, there’s nothing you cannot fix. Putting all your faith in your body when you know there are sometimes you can’t rely on it.” Lena barks, the words stuck between her clenched teeth and her taut jaw.</p><p> </p><p>"I have no idea what–"</p><p> </p><p>"You're <em> Supergirl </em>, Kara!" There's that name again. "Now, all the times I've seen you on the brink of death are replaying in my mind and is your face there! I can't stop– I can’t unsee it. And you and your sister keep talking about Reign and that goddamn fiasco like I’m supposed to get over it, like if I hadn’t found out months ago. There hasn't been a night that you haven't shown up in my dreams, and it sucks because it was two of my best friends fighting to death. I almost lost you both at the same time and I wasn’t aware.”</p><p> </p><p>This escalated way too quickly. Kara only wanted Lena to see the odd creatures and have a nice quasi-bonfire in her second night away from home.</p><p> </p><p>"Lena..." The puzzle. She has to give up the pieces of the puzzle if she wants them starring in a future picture.</p><p> </p><p>"Not tonight. Just–" Lena stands up, away from her–"let's go home."</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Home. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Her heart must stop being so mysterious with its clumsy, arrhythmic outbursts if it is not going to send answers to her brain.</p><p> </p><p>Lena walks three steps ahead of her, and the way back home from the forest has never been further away.</p><p> </p><p>They have to talk. They have to sit down and stop ignoring situations that desperately need to be addressed, because this kind of surprises will keep taking them off guard and exploding in their faces as long as they keep avoiding what is inevitable. </p><p> </p><p>Weeks before, they could hide behind the excuse of beating Lex. None of them had the time, nor the mental faculty to wade through that dense conversation. Now, they have an infinite time limit and there is no place to go as the hourglass spins round and round.</p><p> </p><p>Something is suspended in the motions above them, but neither Kara nor Lena have plucked the courage to grab it. </p><p> </p><p>The bedroom battles the absence of sound while Lena occupies the chambers, and Kara uses the sheets found earlier to make her bed on the windowsill, feeling like a little girl knowing that that night she will sleep under two moons aware of all her secrets and thousands of stars that always guide her home.</p><p> </p><p>But she doesn't take into account that the last time she slept there was a lifetime ago, when her limbs were not so awkwardly long and she could fit into the makeshift bed without hindrance. Her legs swing back and forth, grazing the floor as they jerk in nervous twitches. She knows she looks like a deer caught in the headlights when her roommate walks out of the bathroom, the tension melting after Lena shakes her head with a mocking smile.</p><p> </p><p>"Too big for your own bed?”</p><p> </p><p>"I didn't see that coming," she says, pouting.</p><p> </p><p>"What? That you'd grow up to be a leggy, giant himbo?” </p><p> </p><p>She thinks she's so funny, and Kara conquers the room with two strides, hooking her forefinger under Lena’s chin to lift her head. "Call me a himbo again and you'll have to deal with the consequences."</p><p> </p><p>"What are you going to do? You don't scare me, Danvers.” The defensive square of her shoulders and the raised eyebrow say otherwise. "You're going to have to sleep with me– in the bed… you'll have to sleep in the bed, where I'll sleep too.”</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah." Her chest moves up and down, cerulean orbs flit down to plump lips and she's hit with thirst she seriously requires to be quenched.</p><p> </p><p>Lena looks like the perfect oasis.</p><p> </p><p>But she pulls away before she can have a taste.</p><p> </p><p>The bed lost a great chunk of its dimension while no one was there to keep an eye, and the space between them when they lie on the bedfoam is not enough to accommodate the tension permeating the humid air. </p><p> </p><p>Hands folded under her head, Kara tries to level her breathing, trying to catch her hyperactive brain and put it to rest. But she tosses and turns, and the blanket doesn't cover the entire length of her legs—and perhaps she is a leggy himbo because Lena looks fine wrapped in her own blanket, she has never been more envious of such a peaceful creature.</p><p> </p><p>"That night, when I saw you fall from the sky, I was scared to think about what happened to Supergirl. But you were on the other side of the door after I knocked, and the fear diminished because my only constant was there, even when it wasn't you," she whispers, blunt nails picking at her chapped lips. "By the way, seeing J'onn shape-shifting into you, and what that means is etched in my mind, I will never look at him the same way again.”</p><p> </p><p>"I’m sorry." She lays on her side, watching long lashes flutter and land on flawless skin.</p><p> </p><p>"I know that's just one of many close calls, but it's one of the few that I've seen from up close. I'm sorry for being so harsh before, but I hate that you never run away from danger.”</p><p> </p><p>"I can't, a lot depends on me doing that.”</p><p> </p><p>"Why does it have to be at your expense?” It's watery, her voice cracks and so does Kara’s heart. "What if something happens to you?”</p><p> </p><p>"Then we deal with it. I can't live in fear that there will be a day when I save a life, and I don’t know if that’s the last time I do it. Fear has taken too much from me.”</p><p> </p><p>A five-word loop that borders on the lines of <em> I can't live without you </em> that Kara suspects wasn’t meant for her ears to hear keeps replaying until the record has one too many scratches, but it is the lullaby that leads to a dreamless sleep, chanting <em> I can't live without you </em> nine hundred and ninety-nine times, and a song of regret to complete a thousand sorrows.</p><p>
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</p><p>Kara awakens with a start, and <em> universally acknowledged </em> morning person Lena Luthor is still fast asleep, clinging to her side with an arm wrapped around her waist in the loveliest embrace she's ever known.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Boradium: Krypton's most precious metal.<br/>Fire Falls: a flaming cataract teeming with mutant fish.<br/>Rondor: a rare creature whose single large horn emitted strange radiations that could cure any deadly illness.<br/>Grahu: an artificial material, used for building on Krypton.<br/>Koron, Mithen, Xenon and Wegthorn: the four moons of Krypton.</p><p>all of this information was found in <a href="http://theages.superman.nu/Krypton/glossary.php">this page</a> and it's kind of fun, go check it out if you want to : )</p><p>i hope you're enjoying this as much as i am enjoying writing it!! have a nice week</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. thread of fate</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>kara keeps surprising lena with facts about her past life in krypton, but it's her who gets the biggest surprise when she has an italicized moment at the end of the night.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>Rao has birthed twelve dawns since Lex imprisoned them in the bottle—Kara has officially deemed their situation a <em> dimensional vacay</em>, to alleviate some of the weight prowling on the edges at the possibility of their bodies being stuck in danger back in real life—if she can go by the six lines of thread hanging from the altar where her parents used to beseech the star on days of darkness. Twelve days trapped there, with reminders of Krypton all over the place and no way to distract herself, the burden that transpires from the roots of her birthplace begins to grow in size, and hangs from tired eyelids right in the middle of the final wisps of moonlight and the waning sunrise.</p><p> </p><p>On the second morning she woke up to the whistle of the telepathic hounds in the distance and the red halo suspended high in the sky, Kara decided to breathe new life into a custom that although she practiced on Earth, it left a bitter taste in her mouth—letting herself be guided by a foreign sun while praising Rao.</p><p> </p><p>She remembers with a fond curl of her lips, that the gazebo her uncle Jor-El had helped her father build on the balcony of the left wing of their house was the perfect place to hide while playing hide-and-seek when she had friends over, with grahu panels that offered a 360° from whatever was happening outside, and yet not one could see what was going on inside. Well, a perfect hiding spot it had made until her mother realized what she was using it for, and she endured the longest and most tiresome lecture on <em> never again profaning the worship chambers built explicitly to thank our creator, Kara Zor-El </em>. From that day on, she never returned to the chambers unless she went to ask for Kelex's health, or for that scale replica of the Cosmic Clock she had seen at the mall...</p><p> </p><p>Life used to be so much easier back then.</p><p> </p><p>Hand hovering over the panels, urging the door to slide open and let her out, Kara feels as if another brick has been lifted from her shoulders after extending yet another Thread, and she is close to bouncing on her heels when her head pokes into the bedroom to notice it seems to be lacking the presence of a certain dishevelled brunette. </p><p> </p><p>A brand new update. </p><p> </p><p>Not so much for self-imposed continuity, but rather for a longed-for normalcy in a place where the ease of their peace lies in not letting their minds wander, Kara and Lena had designed a routine that they unwittingly stuck to.</p><p> </p><p>By the time she leaves her prayer session, Lena has mountains of food waiting for her in the kitchen, having already mastered the art of using utensils designed for the use of species light years away from the Milky Way. After they’re finished, Kara chit chats while Lena occupies the bathroom, to the point where Lena gets stressed out because she can't hear Kara under the jets of water, and comes out of the shower with her curly hair dripping on her shoulders and a make-up free pout weaponized at Kara, who lets her win arguments because she is helpless under the threat of bare green eyes and incapable of not being stunned by the brightness of her smile without a layer of lipstick to distract from the real goal. </p><p> </p><p>"Lena!" she shouts, cupping her hands around her mouth and shuffling across empty aisles. Like the kitchen, the greenhouse and the control tower won’t let go of the secret of her friend's whereabouts. The living room, where they fell asleep the fifth night—Lena’s parted lips spurring Kara's laughter after showing her the three-dimensional TV—gives nothing away. "Kieran, where are you?" </p><p> </p><p>About to give up, frustration pulling at the edges of her robe, she hears the methodical clack of metal crashing into the ground, and a smile replaces the scowl on her face as she pokes her head on the doorway of her father's lab. Way taller than all those years ago, the doorknob digs in her thigh where it used to be a prominent threat for her head as she snuck in to scare him, and seeing Lena sitting there, a screwdriver caught between her teeth… Kara thinks it’s the sweetest figment of reminiscence she’s lived in a long time.</p><p> </p><p>There goes another update. </p><p> </p><p>Three days before, Kara decided there wasn’t a way to make the lab look more suitable, and after hours of debate with herself, she took Lena to the workroom she had found on one of her nightly routes. </p><p> </p><p>One thing she regrets about being, of course, so thoughtful, it’s that four walls stole Lena’s attention without giving her a chance for a duel. But the engraved smile on her face, oil-stained cheeks and flyaways on her loose bun are enough encouragement after the defeat.</p><p> </p><p>"Is this like a Real Steel thing or was it you who made this mess?" Kara asks, sauntering into the room on the tips of her boots to dodge the fallen scraps of metal.</p><p> </p><p>"I've been meaning to tell you, that film isn’t accurate. We are years away from having such large and sentient androids—there is no power source that can support a system like that, yet. It's not a field I've tried my hand at," Lena confesses, smug but honest, muffled by the tool stuck in her teeth. The legs of the bench screech as she turns, greeting Kara with a guilty smile. "Think of it as a RoboCop situation, instead. I  didn't calculate distances and the toolbox... way down it went. I'm sorry if I interrupted your time."</p><p> </p><p>"I’ve fought robots before! When I was a rookie, this Red Tornado guy started feeling things and almost had my head. Plus, my childhood best friend was a robot, don't mind me if I'm a faithful advocate of the possibility," she defends, sticking out her tongue. Lena nudges her chin in the direction of the golden wire Kara is fiddling with, and she drops it in her hands, along with a good morning kiss on her cheek that Lena blissfully leans into. "You didn’t, interrupt me. I was wondering where you were."</p><p> </p><p>"You were looking for me?" Lena questions, biting the tip of tongue that darts out of her lips as she wraps the wire around the needle-nose pliers her hand handles.</p><p> </p><p>"You weren't in our bedroom, or in the twenty other places I looked.” Her arms go to her sides in a half-shrug, travelling upward but falling back flat before she gets to fix glasses that aren’t there.</p><p> </p><p>"The second you give me a screwdriver, a hammer, and a laser welder, it’s hard to get me back.”</p><p> </p><p>"I noticed." Kara grunts, face flushing as Lena steals a look at her from the corner of her eye. "I mean, you didn’t make breakfast this morning and–  not that I can't cook breakfast for myself! Or breakfast for two. It's just… well, we haven’t had breakfast together in a couple days.” She settles with that, working her jaw as she overlooks the mocking smirk that Lena tries to suppress.</p><p> </p><p>"Breathe, Danvers. If you mean yesterday, when I found you drinking juice straight from the jug, or today when there are still more than three hours left for breakfast to be acceptable," she says, arching an eyebrow, “then I'm sorry for neglecting you."</p><p> </p><p>"You make it sound like I'm trying to say you're a lousy roommate."</p><p> </p><p>"Isn't that what you're implying?”</p><p> </p><p>"Of course not. Move your butt–" she plops down next to Lena on the bench–”what I’m saying is… I miss having you around.”</p><p> </p><p>"I’m here no more than two hours per day, and that’s saying something, you’re well aware of my lab quota. Aren’t the other twenty-two hours we spend together enough?”</p><p> </p><p>Kara rolls her eyes, embarrassed at the raw disclosure of how much she craves Lena’s presence. It's not unusual for her to like spending so much time with her friend. She has been in a deficit of Lena time for most part of the last year, it’s unacceptable. It's only fair that she seizes the opportunity that's being handed to her on a silver platter.</p><p> </p><p>"What's got you so cranky today, Grumpy Pants?" she teases, poking Lena’s cheek until her finger sinks into a dimple. </p><p> </p><p>"I can't get this thing to work." The rim of the workshop table makes a shrilling sound when Lena hits it with the tip of the pliers, and Kara shudders with the awful echo that ricochets.</p><p> </p><p>"I don't know if you've tried this before, and it may be commentary you shouldn't pay attention to, but... being in an alternate dimension, everything works in a mirror effect. So it's likely that–"</p><p> </p><p>"Shit." Kara can see the exact moment Lena realizes where she is wrong and is about to laugh, but the mortified curve of plump lips doesn't let her. "Excuse me while I go be an idiot somewhere else."</p><p> </p><p>"Says Lena Luthor, currently designing– wait, what are you doing? It doesn't matter– currently mastering the engineering of a planet way more advanced than hers. Congratulations, you're a dumb genius." Kara laughs, wheezing after Lena elbows her, and then lips are parting and eyes go wide, trying to figure out if the whine she hears after squeezing Lena's thigh is real or a false memory.</p><p> </p><p>She doesn't have time to ponder further, because Lena stands up and her hand falls like a dead reptile onto the plush leather of their seat. In Lena’s hands is an abstract metal body that conjures up a fleeting memento of one of the things she has been searching for since they were thrown into this small place in the shape of a fallen piece of land in the northwest of <em> Lurvan, Krypton. </em></p><p> </p><p>"That's Kelex." Swallowing the knot in her throat, Kara exclaims and jumps to her feet, almost knocking Lena down. </p><p> </p><p>"This robot thing? I've seen something like it before, in the Fortress of Solitude."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, no. I haven't had the heart to tell Kal that the robot we have on Earth isn't exactly like the one I had as a child." She rubs the back of her neck, fists shaking with the desire to hold the inert weight in Lena's hands. "Touch its back, should be in the left shoulder pad."</p><p> </p><p>"Who’s Kal?"</p><p> </p><p>"Clark, my cousin," Kara says, making grabby hands, but Lena unconsciously turns her body away from her goal.</p><p> </p><p><em> "Superman.” </em> </p><p> </p><p>Kara is used to hearing his alter ego identity being uttered with pride, disbelief, a spark of commendation as it slips from the lips of a humanity thankful with its candid savior. The few times she has heard it with such stoicism, they have come from her own lips. </p><p> </p><p>But now Lena competes.</p><p> </p><p>Said in such a way... derogatory in its origin, but reduced to a drowned out whisper—to a rope of conformity Lena clings to so as not to fall into the pit of truth omissions.</p><p> </p><p>"Aye." She bites her lips, then purses them, and goes back to biting. "I thought you knew, with everything that happened–"</p><p> </p><p>"–he’s not the Super I've been thinking about all year.” It’s a low blow, but Kara takes it with a champion crown and an enthralled grin. </p><p> </p><p>"Right." Guilt obscures her features, and she doesn't know if it's better for Lena to see the dark cloak that preludes the burning blush on her cheeks.</p><p> </p><p>Lena steers her mechanical companion, and it crunches in her hands as it is manoeuvred by an expert and yet careless controller who’s clouded under the exodus of her mind to a place that had been vacant for a few long days. "We should be having that conversation soon," Lena whispers, sobering up as her fingers trace the place where <em> KZ </em>is engraved, shaky and written on by the hands of a child. "I'm tired of being blindsided by this.”</p><p> </p><p><em> This </em>being the key word.</p><p> </p><p>In the most unexpected moments, in the most mundane situations, a throwing star is launched against them to tear the pages of the accounting journals they would rather keep intact—comments and confessions that make their thread a mess, and the knots are pit stops where they have to get strength back.</p><p> </p><p>"Tonight?" Kara suggests, touching the scars that smear the otherwise flawless skin of Lena's fingerprints. </p><p> </p><p>"Tonight sounds good." She nods, turning her wrist until taking her hand is an easy task. "Here, I think this belongs to you." Lena hands the robot to her like if it were a newborn, and Kara laughs with the irony of the action. She threads more carefully when it comes to state-of-the-art pieces of technology than a living person.</p><p> </p><p>Her name jotted down is written memorabilia on an almost forgotten timeline, a treasure that comes out of hiding and to her without being summoned. </p><p> </p><p>It’s the shock of surprise that makes tears well up in her eyes. It’s a shock when Lena's fingers splay on her cheek, her thumb traces the delicate skin under her eyelid. </p><p> </p><p>Kara doesn’t have the courage to stare into her eyes, and her shoulders shake with a silent sob that she disguises into a bitter laugh. "I'm sorry I’m such a crying mess, but–"</p><p> </p><p>That thread of thought never gets to see its end, because Lena crashes against her body and she’s hugging her as Kara’s whole organism implodes before emerging again and clinging to her with all the strength she can muster from an intoxicated perspective.</p><p> </p><p>Being in Lena's arms is... it has taken her nearly four years to define the sensation. When it flounders on the tip of her tongue, a shower of synonyms cascades down and threatens to obscure the meaning she has taken so long to construct. It's beautiful, enticing, magnificent. </p><p> </p><p>Aphrodite of embraces in the way Lena weaves herself with the mass Kara occupies on that elemental plane, and Kara manages to relate the event in detail as a spectator of this divine myth revered for the beauty of its genesis.</p><p> </p><p>To be held by Lena gets, without a doubt, the first place on the podium of wonders she has classified throughout her life. Fire Falls, Gold Volcanos and Rainbow Canyons are a distant second place compared to the heat that flows from Lena's pores joined to her own.</p><p> </p><p>"No matter how twisted things may get between us, I want you to know that you’ll always have me, I’ll keep you out of the darkness," Lena assures, and it’s what cauterizes the wound that almost leads Kara to bleed out on the floor of her father's laboratory, in the land of her former city, in the core of her home world.</p><p> </p><p>A couple of ragged breaths are what drives Kara to realize that it is their first genuine hug—where they’re both aware—in a long eternity. It isn’t induced by despair at trying to find each other while wandering in a foreign place, or by despair at an upcoming battle. It’s brought by Lena, warm-hearted and melting in her arms, tied up around Kara like a feverish reminder that this is the place where she belongs.</p><p> </p><p>"Even when I'm being dramatic?" Kara asks. Lena uses her shoulder as rest for her chin, and Kara smiles, eyes twinkling at the sound of Lena's laughter.</p><p> </p><p>"Even then. You weren't so dramatic when I met you, I feel a mix of responsibility and pride.”</p><p> </p><p>"Poor is the pupil who does not surpass their master." It takes a chunk of her willpower to not let the shiver overtake her when Lena's lips brush the sharp line of her jaw. </p><p> </p><p>"What do you say we leave your robot here for a while and go get breakfast? I'm famished." Her stomach roars in sympathy.</p><p> </p><p>Breakfast ends up being an affair of breakfast-turned-into-brunch-because-they-got-distracted-then-it-was-late, and after taking showers, they are steadily reaching early afternoon by the time they leave, tied by the hand as if there was a chance to get lost in a world inhabited by only the two of them.</p><p> </p><p>"Where are you taking me?” Lena tries to pry the intel from her, walking a step behind Kara as she kicks tiny red stones out of their way.</p><p> </p><p>"We used to call it the <em> end line </em>," she divulges, tugging at her hand to point out the loss of height in a rocky strait. "It's where the dome ends, the line that separates Argo from the rest of Krypton. At least, it used to.”</p><p> </p><p>"You could see the rest of the planet from here?”</p><p> </p><p>Kara humms. “Before the city was separated from..."</p><p> </p><p>"Right." Her thumb draws a single circle on the inside of Kara’s wrist. "Don’t forget I’m pretty expensive, and if I get hurt my insurance company will haunt you for the rest of your life to make sure you solve my <em> dimensional vacay </em>leave." They both see the truth behind the abrupt change of subject.</p><p> </p><p>Kara's eyes twinkle, thankful. "It's a little offensive to suggest that I would let you fall."</p><p> </p><p>"You don't have your powers here, Danvers. You are one of us."</p><p> </p><p>She looks to the side and nods once, lips curled up in a cocky smirk. <em> "It's a little offensive to suggest that I would let you fall.” </em></p><p> </p><p>"I guess I'll have to rely on the premise of your diminished reflexes." Lena scoffs, squeezing the flesh she’s gripped as support. "How far?" Letting go of her stubbornness for the sake of honesty is an act of courage that Kara receives with open arms, and the crimson glow that outlines her silhouette is a compound that makes Kara buzz with anticipation.</p><p> </p><p>"Getting tired? You jump off balconies and cliffs like you’re in the Olympics, but sand scares you?” Kara takes the opportunity to tease her best friend, to indulge in the alluring blush that reaches her ears as Lena narrows her eyes at her.</p><p> </p><p>"You're on thin ice." She grumbles through clenched teeth, and an unauthorized squeal escapes from her lips when her feet leave the ground, Kara hooking one arm under her knees, the other clasping her torso tight against her solid chest. "Maybe you get a few more days to live." Stroking the short hairs on the nape of her neck, Lena rests her head on the place where her heart beats and can't tame the glow of her smile as she listens to it.</p><p> </p><p>The end line is about a hundred feet after that, but Kara makes the most of their trip in spite of the pull of her muscles. She is relentless, and doesn’t leave her precious cargo on the ground until she knows they have arrived. </p><p> </p><p>"We are here."</p><p> </p><p>"Here, where?" Lena asks, smoothing out the wrinkles in her trousers with her hands, regaining her composure. The slow pace she turns around to see what’s happening is amusing to Kara.</p><p> </p><p>The pockets in her own pants are gracefully deep and Kara shoves her sweaty hands there. "This is the end line."</p><p> </p><p>"I hope you're not pulling my leg because you know very well that I hate–"</p><p> </p><p>"–when I tease you, I know, I'm not. Come here." Kara orders, swinging on the heels of her boots before stepping aside, giving Lena space. "Stretch out your hand."</p><p> </p><p>Where her limb should rise to form a flat angle parallel to her chest, Lena's arm halts halfway, a line that doesn’t reach its destination, fingers splaying on the invisible barrier that forbids her from advancing.</p><p> </p><p>"You can't see it," she adds, puffing her cheeks to blow upwards where locks of hair fall over her eyes. "That's pretty much what makes it so cool. You know the dome is there only because you can touch it, but you have to know what’s the perimeter it covers if you don't want to–" she touches her forehead against the cold material of the dome–"crash into it. I've had some nasty run-ins with it.” Kara looks at Lena again in time to notice green eyes glued to the skin between her eyebrows. </p><p> </p><p>"Is that how you got your scar?"</p><p> </p><p>"Funnily enough, no." Her laugh is embarrassed, and she glances at her boots digging holes in the sand. "Remember when I told you about Wegthorn? And how angry I was about the space flights? The night the energy waves reached our orbit, the whole planet was lit up by the residual glow from the explosion, Olbers starry night kind of thing. It was <em> pre-tty </em>scary.”</p><p> </p><p>Perhaps, in contrast to the other detonation in her repertoire, the thundering death of that satellite didn’t undergo the same diffusion as the elegy dedicated to the silent eradication of Krypton. But Kara never forgot the storm before the calm, the desperate cries causing traffic in the cold wind of the night a colony died.</p><p> </p><p>"My parents hadn't come home yet, and I had no idea what was happening, so I hid in the gazebo where I go pray, and waited there for hours.”</p><p> </p><p>"That's why you don't like small spaces," Lena guesses, "I often wondered why you'd prefer a bus brimming with germs over a perfectly comfy Rolls Royce.”</p><p> </p><p>"Hey! I've carpooled with you as many times as you've asked me to."</p><p> </p><p>"And you've forced me to ride public transport the same number of times."</p><p> </p><p>"So dear of you to mingle with us, the ninety-nine percent pleb,” Kara quips, well behaved and polite in the set off of her satire. “But yes, to your first affirmation, guess that's kind of the reason why I sometimes feel like... claustrophobic?"</p><p> </p><p>"Go ahead." Lena reminds her, stretching her fingers to give better access to Kara's nervous ones. </p><p> </p><p>"Oh, right!" She shakes her head, groaning as golden wisps tumble back down on her periphery. "It was my dad who found me there, and I was so eager to run into his arms that I completely ignored the altar I was hiding under, and well, the rest is history and my scar is the living proof of it.”.</p><p> </p><p>"You can be so dumb sometimes." Lena's strides leave them separated by a few inches, and Kara's chest expands endless sizes with the breath she holds as a pale hand reaches out and eases the light-coloured, misbehaving curls of what used to be bangs behind her ear.</p><p> </p><p>"I'm afraid I don’t do well with explosions," she stutters, finding green eyes already on her.</p><p> </p><p>The hand that Lena used to fix her hair takes a new direction, and her thumb lands right on the blemish that has marred Kara's face for as long as she can remember, blazing as the rest of her palm cradles her jaw. She has to bite her lip, gulping down the pleased hum born in the depths of her throat. </p><p> </p><p>"Scars can be… appealing," Lena whispers above her lips, clicking her tongue. "They give you character. If you hadn't had that single mark when I met you, I would’ve sworn you were a government experiment.”</p><p> </p><p>"Like Albert from <em> How to Build a Better Boy</em>?"</p><p> </p><p>"More like a ridiculously charming and even more jacked-up Captain America, but you get the gist of it,” she concedes, “your ability to come up with atrocious film titles in any situation is creepy and unbelievable in equivalent portions.” Lena slips her thumb through her scar, past her eyebrows as her eyes flutter close. "Some people have an affinity for them, scars.”</p><p> </p><p>Blue eyes fly open again, to the attack. "You dig them?" Kara wonders, innocent and eager. She doesn't even care about the answer, she's just curious.<br/><br/></p><p>Curiosity killed the cat.<br/><br/></p><p>"They kind of grow on me.” Kara blows a breath and her fingers uncurl from where they were gripping the soft flesh of ample hips.</p><p> </p><p>But satisfaction brought it back.</p><p> </p><p>"I learnt to see them as part of one’s journey, they are lessons in shying away from inevitable death. I would fear if someone makes it to the end without a scratch, you can’t have a fulfilling life without feeling a little pain," Lena continues, mumbling against her collarbone. "Sorry if I sound like a mindfulness instructor, but I've been reading so much about spirituality and healing, there's a quote that stuck with me. ‘The looming threat of death starts to seem absurd. Things are constantly dying, we find–"</p><p> </p><p>"–or rather," Kara intervenes, "they are constantly in flux, arising and passing away with each moment of consciousness’.” The mouthing at the hollow of her neck stops, and Kara can hear the whistle of Lena sucking on a breath. </p><p> </p><p>"Did you read the book?"</p><p> </p><p>Seventeen times since she handed it to her. </p><p> </p><p>The first time, it took her more than a week to finish it. The words were a constant reminder of the gap between them, and Kara was a mess in the breaks between chapters. The next four times, the reading was on autopilot, dwindled to distracted eyes flitting through paragraph after paragraph, only capturing the black ink on the yellowish paper, instead of their meaning. Then, when they took a step closer to solving their brawl, it had become her favorite way to pass the time; a fixture in her everyday routine: spine cracked open on the sink while taking a shower, upside down while she hung from the push-up bar mounted to the wall, pages fluttering as she carried it across National City’s sky. There was an infinite number of times that piece of Lena merged with Kara.</p><p> </p><p>She's sure it is on her nightstand, waiting for her to return and open its secrets once more.</p><p> </p><p>"A couple of times." She shrugs, feigning indifference. "It's a good book."</p><p> </p><p>"Is it?"</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, very insightful." Kara’s life is suddenly threatened by the quirk of a tweezed eyebrow. "I did like it! It's not the kind of thing I’m used to reading, but I enjoyed it. It's– the first few times I read it, I was thinking about you and… it was kinda painful."</p><p> </p><p>"How many times have you read it?" </p><p> </p><p>"Four times? Five, tops." </p><p> </p><p>"Apart from the fact that you're a terrible liar, there's a complete look on your stupid cute face giving you away." </p><p> </p><p>"That crinkle will be the death of me, won't it?" Her shoulders sag, but a smile plays on her lips. "Seventeen and a half.”</p><p> </p><p>"Twice less than me. Somehow, I'm still coming out on top.” Lena bites the inside of her cheeks, the shadow of her cheekbones cunningly attractive.</p><p> </p><p>Kara snorts, cowering at Lena’s glare, and regains her footing. "Your ability to read that much with your busy schedule is creepy and unbelievable in equivalent portions,” she shoots back, and lets Lena wander to explore on her own.</p><p> </p><p>The dome is there, safe and everlasting in an irregular constant. Beyond that, far from the barrier, the sky spills with an infinite limit, a blood desert with no near end. She is stuck in the memory of spending entire afternoons waiting for someone to come from the other side to offer a sign of life, a sign of victory. She doesn’t hear when Lena speaks. </p><p> </p><p>"Mhmm?"</p><p> </p><p>"I had way too much time off this year," she admits, yanking the buttons on the left side of her shirt. "It turns out that post-CEO life is not so hectic.” The way Lena hisses is enough to take Kara’s attention away from the bigger picture, and lean it back on her. There's a deep nostalgia in her confession, and Kara’s heart is clutched in the coolest of grips at the thought of the countless ways the Crisis also crushed her efforts with that calamitous wave.</p><p> </p><p>"Is there a chance you will rebrand the company?”</p><p> </p><p>"It’s probably the first thing I'll do when we get out of here, I won’t let a bigoted man ruin my life’s efforts and hard work."</p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry it happened, I know how much L-Corp meant to you."</p><p> </p><p>"The good thing is—if there's a bright side to all this—that people don't seem to hate the Luthors here, and I'm not a goddamn awful pariah in this place." </p><p> </p><p>"You never have been one for me."</p><p> </p><p>Lena laughs. "I don’t doubt that, but unfortunately, as much as I would like to, your opinion isn't the only one I need to keep the empire afloat." </p><p> </p><p>"Well, when the rebrand happens, it will be run by you and you, Lena Luthor, are a beacon of help and compassion.” Kara sighs, shaking off the sudden weight of the conversation. "If I can be of any help, I make a heck of a window cleaner.” </p><p> </p><p>"Supergirl flying over the building with a squeegee and Windex in her hands, working under a Luthor's payroll," Lena suggests, smug, savoring the image on the tip of her tongue. "Must be quite the show.” </p><p> </p><p>"Seeing is believi–" a crackle behind them alarms her, and Kara is standing in front of Lena in a second, throwing her hand back to make sure she’s still there. "You heard that?”</p><p> </p><p>The sound comes again, this time more distant, but heedful to her intuitions it sounds like the warning siren that presages disaster. It's the two of them inhabiting this place, the possibility of someone else stealing the space they cohabit had crossed out the first twenty-four hours counted since they landed there. </p><p> </p><p>In a place where Kara and Lena are the ones who can make noise without the intervention of any element, it is dreadful to hear anything other than the purring of the singing flowers. The skin on her arms and neck rises, preparing to protect Lena from any imminent threat. </p><p> </p><p>Taking a wide stride forward, Kara pulls her with her, and squints with the need to sharpen her senses, but she’s standing in a giant inhibitor of the powers she depends on. Following the source kickstarting her self-defense mechanisms, they walk the entire path marked by the end line, upright beside them, and when the high grass opens up in a narrow corner, Kara doesn't think twice about it and dives into the unknown, ignoring the warning calls behind her. </p><p> </p><p>She's been here before. </p><p> </p><p>They are safe here.</p><p> </p><p>The threatening reverberation turns out to be a bird's chirp, and Kara is bouncing before even seeing the creature.</p><p> </p><p>"Lena!" She whispers-shouts, clutching her friend's arm, preventing the animal from being scared off. "It's a nightwing!"</p><p> </p><p>Sure enough, a bird with a wide back of regal shades of prussian-blue and black rests from its flight with its claws scratching the expanse of orange-ish soil below them. Its hoarse gurgle fills her chest, a golden cooing that cascades down, slides through the curves of her sternum and falls into her heart, mixed with the boiling blood that bubbles up and prickles behind surprised eye sockets. </p><p> </p><p>One step is all it takes for her inhibition to be altered by the bird's innate flight risk, but it also takes one line from Kara's soft cooing and shushing to nest it in hands, wings fluttering once before the nightwing settles into the solid palms that hold it.</p><p> </p><p>"Hi, little one. It's been a long time since I've seen one of your kind."</p><p> </p><p>Grass rustles behind her, and a hand opens above the curve between her neck and shoulder, grounding her when threatened by the tempting desire to fly away with the creature. "What is it?"</p><p> </p><p>"A nightwing," she answers, wide-reaching-manic beam set in place. The aforementioned creature closes its eyes as Kara slips her index finger into the fur that cushions its skull, and the empathetic gust of wind that slams into her neck, Lena's chin hooked to the tender tissue of her trapezius, makes her knees buckle.</p><p> </p><p>"I heard you call it that, darling, but a little context would be nice."</p><p> </p><p>Twisting her neck a bit to the side, eyes searching for Lena's face, she says, "this is a typical Krypton wildlife bird. It’s barely a hatchling, they grow way bigger. Remember the time a dragon invaded Main Street? Something like that."</p><p> </p><p>"So, this tiny, gullible, won’t-do-no-harm fluffball grows up to be a beast," Lena states, following Kara's gaze to the animal sleeping in her hands. </p><p> </p><p>"They're a little dangerous, to be honest, but they've always come to me. I used to be a bird whisperer in this place.” Eyebrows wiggling, Kara gloats, and her smile tampers down to a serene grin.</p><p> </p><p>"A girl of many talents, I can see that one-hundred percent happening.”</p><p> </p><p>"The nightwing, and its counterpart, the flamebird—red, orange and yellow—were the representative birds of Krypton.” Kara bites her tongue. "They were kind of our ying-yang, expressing the remarkable contrast between two things. In fact, it was an important point to consider before a couple could give their <em> I do’s </em>in the Jewel of Truth and Honor, and an unforgivable requirement before submitting an application for the use of the Matrix.”</p><p> </p><p>"The birthing chambers?" The slight intonation is more inclined to be a statement, but Lena adds it anyway, giving her the chance to explain the phenomenon with her own words. She dismounts from her body, and walking past her, her whole hand wraps around two of Kara's fingers and pulls forward, toward the hidden pond the wildlife covers.</p><p> </p><p>"Mhmm. To be able to use them, you and your partner needed to be a perfect match, and the Law of Night and Fire was the executor of this regulation," she says, letting herself be guided by the pair of eyes that are not focused on the creature. "A nightwing was the representation of a cool-headed, reserved person, rational in their manner of acting but fierce in the way they protected their beloved, while the flamebird was the loud energy in the deal, lively and fiery in their desire to show the world the pride of having found love.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara's explanation doesn't go past them, and they look at each other, the understanding that she just described them in terms of Krypton's constitution falling like the first flake on a long-awaited holiday, melting into skin that decides to ignore the cold with the intention of not embracing what it means.</p><p> </p><p>"I know more about Krypton in the days we have been here than every single diary I’ve read in my life.” Lena chuckles, chin tucked into her sudden shyness to hide the red shadow that blooms colour into her face. </p><p> </p><p>"You know what’s important." Kara raises her shoulders, kneeling to lay the bird down after it starts to shift. It circles around, feeling the ground, before taking off again, wings fluttering above them. "Everyone can look up Krypton’s altitude and weather on the Internet, and have discussions on Reddit about the engineering behind our pods." Lena blushes, and Kara stores that reaction for future discussion. "But you're probably the one person in the world, besides me, who now knows the meaning of these two species in our culture.”</p><p> </p><p>It's probably her favorite update in this surreal time breach. To be able to share with Lena so much data—small in its denotation, but colossal in its connotations—equals being able to stand at her most honest boundary, her natural habitat, exposing the secrets and whispered words of a culture that has been tied to the limbo for years, hanging from the dim light found in the depths of her mind to stay alive.</p><p> </p><p>"What about your cousin?"</p><p> </p><p>"Kal is..." Kara sighs, summoning courage from the wet-dirt-smelling air. "He’s a human with Kryptonian DNA, the son of Jonathan and Martha, not Jor-El’s and Lara’s." She recounts a thought that has been stuck in her mind for years, knowing that Lena would never judge her where others would glare at her as if she had grown a third eye. "He doesn't know the importance behind small details like why we tap twice when we hug someone we love. </p><p> </p><p>“He never experienced the stomach cramps from hours of laughing after listening to uncle Jor’s Day of Passage experience whenever he and Lara came to visit from Kandor. And when I say the word <em> yagrum </em>–” the kryptonese slips with ease—”he will think of anything but the legend that parents used to make their children go to bed. Everything Kal knows about his home planet is because the Matrix put it in his brain, not because he lived it.” She finishes with an earth-shattering sigh, hoping that a knife would materialise out of thin air and cut through the tension caused by the raw honesty of her admission. </p><p> </p><p>Lena’s hand in hers, constant and never fading away, doesn’t allow her to hide in a shell.</p><p> </p><p><em> Constant</em>. That word is a perfect candidate for the way Kara would describe Lena. </p><p> </p><p>"The way you talk about them– I know you had a whole different life before Earth, but hearing you talking about this… I wish you could live those experiences at least one more time,” Lena murmurs, lost in thought, “have you ever talked to someone else about this? Your sister, maybe?" It pulls at her heartstrings that what used to be a jovial cheer of <em> Alex </em> or a mocking warning of <em> Agent Danvers </em> is now the bitter spew of the familial title that binds her to Kara. But that battle doesn’t belong to her, and she needs to let some things go. </p><p> </p><p>"Before we moved out of Midvale, we used to talk a lot about Krypton. She's a pretty curious soul, and talking about home made me happy so it was dubbed a win-win."</p><p> </p><p>"You were lucky to be part of a decent family," Lena says and it's not green with envy, would never be. With it, she carries the resonance of resignation that has been cooking for a long time, and there is where the nostalgic comment grows, not from a place of malice.</p><p> </p><p>She was. Kara went beyond the limits of luck to be drawn at the Danvers' home. </p><p> </p><p>"Landing with the Luthors is not exactly what I would call a lucky strike," Lena adds as an afterthought, and it still doesn't carry a bitter tone, not even under. It's an innocent confession, which Kara knows has been building behind unsafe walls years before it’s expelled by sad, turned downward lips. </p><p> </p><p>"Wasn't becoming a billionaire heiress a huge advantage?" she taunts, employing the dreadful excuse Lena uses when trying to get the truth out of her, providing her with an out if she isn’t in the right mind quadrant to talk about it, but Kara puts it out there for her anyway. </p><p> </p><p>Lena falls into the trap, but this time she decides to take the right path in a steady story of crooked lines. She sits at the edge of the pond after Kara invites her to do so, but refuses the next suggestion and prefers to watch as Kara rolls up her pants and long legs sink into the water, Lena herself sitting with her own legs crossed and maintaining a decent distance between her and the water body.</p><p> </p><p>"You know I was adopted by the Luthors when I was four," she begins, grabbing the flicks of grass her hands can reach. "And you also know that Lillian was a bitch to me from day one, but Lex and Father… they were my support system, until they no longer were. Lionel was nurturing and I guess he did care about me, he saw to it that I was comfortable in a mansion with a bigger poolhouse than the cottage I lived in with mum.</p><p> </p><p>“Then there's Lex. I hadn't started kindergarten when I was shipped to America, so I didn't know what it was like to interact with other kids, exactly. It was me and mum—and, for a short span of time, this funny old man who I found out a couple of years ago was my grandfather—so having a brother was kind of out of nowhere, and he was the best, willing to play chess with me when I would sneak into his room in the middle of the night.” Her laugh is wet, and Kara plants her palm on her knee, facing upwards to be taken.</p><p> </p><p>“So you were born a chess mastermind?" She offers a half-sided, sly, effervescent smile as she seeks to give her support. </p><p> </p><p>"I do what I can. It's a box that needs to be ticked off when your last name is Luthor." Lena grins back, and she seems calm, attaching green eyes to the crystalline reflection of the rippling crystalline waters. "I don't know if it was fueled by my childish naivety, or if Lex was a good brother, but I looked up to him while growing up, wanting his approval in everything I did. As I said before, they were decent people until one day they weren’t, and what I had once considered a glimpse of heaven on earth after tasting death, revealed its true colors and turned out to be hell disguised as salvation.</p><p> </p><p>The years between that realization and the day Lillian—by trying to get rid of me actually did me a favor—exiled me to boarding school... <em>god, </em>they were a nightmare. Father was drunk and throwing stuff all the time, Lex went through puberty and became a condescending little twat, and Lillian… isn’t it kind of bad karma that she ended up being the one I have a closer relation with? It's a hell of a ride being the charity case of the richest family in the country."</p><p> </p><p>"I've said it before and I'll say it as many times as I have to, but the Luthor name doesn't deserve you."</p><p> </p><p>Her lips draw a straight line, eyes darting to where Kara's thumb leaves a burning path on her knee bone. "There's not much in store for a four-year-old orphan who ended up being the biological daughter of a tycoon with anger issues and a permanently bent elbow.”</p><p> </p><p>"There's a chance for all of us, messed up kids,” she reassures. There has to be.</p><p> </p><p>Kara would like to push and dig deeper about her life before them, to ask more about the little bits a toddler could remember. But Lena, despite everything, has let her guard down and removed the chain on her door to let her in and she can’t express gratitude further than that. So she decides to wait, trusting that their time here will last much longer, and that Lena will come to her on her own, when the time is right. </p><p>"A terrible third-dimensional movie about a failed marriage is waiting for us at home, next to whatever snacks I raid from the cupboards. Sounds like a plan?" Drilling through the silence, Kara offers and squeezes her hand.</p><p> </p><p>"Sounds like a perfect plan.”</p><p> </p><p>Most of her pant leg is wet, and Kara has to wait to put her boots back on, but Lena is patient and an expert at small talk while she shakes her legs the way a wet dog would. The stone wall that borders one side of the pond offers support, and Kara reaches out to help Lena stand up when she finishes tying her shoes. </p><p> </p><p>The sharp edges of the stones digging in her back and a woman leaning on her torso are a funny reminder, and the ironic laughter escapes her lips before she can stop it. "Random trivia, this is the place where I almost had my first kiss."</p><p> </p><p>Lena quirks an eyebrow, blood rushing to her lips as she drags her teeth across them. "Do tell."</p><p> </p><p>"We were back at the end line, and a couple of friends challenged Lesla-Lar—who I had a ginormous crush on—and me to come over here and, well, see what happened. So we did, and I was right in this very spot, innocently waiting for something to happen, and boy did it happen!" she cackles, grabbing Lena by her forearms to avoid tripping, and feels her shake with the spurts of a subdued laugh born at the expense of her own humor. "I got a mouthful of water from her. She was kind of a meanie, and pushed me into the pond."</p><p> </p><p>One of them stops laughing, and it's not Kara. Lena straightens her back, green eyes piercing her face with fiery precision, but she coughs and the cushioning smile returns to her face in a quick leap. “She?" her voice is an octave higher, and Kara fears she has said something wrong.</p><p> </p><p>She also straightens up, and suddenly they are two taut, vertical bricks staring at each other, mouths gaping and unable to formulate words. It’s Kara who dares to speak first. "Ah, yes. Lesla was a girl, is there– do you have a problem with that?”</p><p> </p><p>"No!" Lena sputters, startling them both with the stupor of her outburst. "I didn't know that– you know, you liked girls. You've never mentioned it before."</p><p> </p><p>"It wasn't something that mattered on Krypton, and I never felt the need to come out when I became an Earth citizen. I love who I love and that’s it, but it's been a while since I've been interested in anyone, romantically speaking.”</p><p> </p><p><em> It's because you've been interested in someone for a long while </em> , her brains shouts and her eyebrows furrow. It's an entity that's constantly against her, but lately it's getting out of control. <em> What does that mean? </em> she asks back, because sometimes Kara might be slow and she kinds of… needs the push.</p><p> </p><p>"So your first kiss was going to be with a girl named Lesla, who ended up pushing you into this very lake."</p><p> </p><p>Kara nods her head vigorously. "Yup, pretty much sums it up."</p><p> </p><p>"Do you like girls with a mean streak or was it a one-time thing?”</p><p> </p><p>"In my defense–" she thinks of Siobhan, and Leslie’s teasing nature. Then there was that weird undertone with Miss Grant that she decided to ignore for the sake of their bond, and Lucy was more <em> badass </em>than she was mean, so it didn't count. Lena, she would like any way–"I have none."</p><p> </p><p>"A pretty mysterious pause," Lena observes, and Kara has the urge to ask her to lower her eyebrow once and for all because it’s doing <em> things</em>. "Humour me, Kara Zor-El, were you the sensation among Kryptonian youth?"</p><p> </p><p>The easy way her name is pronounced has tendrils of warmth bursting across the circuits of her heart.</p><p> </p><p>Instead of giving an answer, she throws her head back in laughter, mildly amused at her friend's accusation against the innocence of a regular teenager wanting to kiss the girl she was attracted to. "I'll have you know, young Luthor, that young <em> me </em>was the smartest kid in town, and, have you seen how blue my eyes are? People loved them." She flashes said orbs, giving Lena the ocean blue sight of a human-free island.</p><p> </p><p>"I can hate you so much sometimes." Lena groans, provoking more uneven bursts of Kara's giggles.</p><p> </p><p>"Then I'll take advantage of the times you don't."</p><p> </p><p>The way back home is a brand new route, diverging from the one that had been recorded by memory from the Fire Falls, and Kara takes the initiative in the middle of a road with more flow of fauna, stepping carefully so as not to slip on the big slimy rocks that they have to cross if they want to return to their humble abode. The stones of greater magnitude she leaves alone, but if there is the slightest possibility of clearing the way for the woman panting behind her from the hike, her boot kicks and then it’s free for Lena to cross without impediment. </p><p> </p><p>This is like the trips she and Alex used to take in Midvale, with the slight difference that she can actually feel her muscles crying out for mercy, and Lena isn’t such a chatty companion, saving her air reserves to keep her lungs afloat.</p><p> </p><p>She's too busy with her mind millions of light years away—quite literally—to notice that the passage is now much narrower, and although she's the one with squeaking-wet soles, it's Lena who squeals by her side when she takes a wrong step, and in a reflex drive, Kara grabs her by the waist and turns on her midriff to break her fall, gasping for breath when her back hits the rocky surface of the ground. </p><p> </p><p>Having forgotten that under the red sun she is vulnerable, she fails to hit the nail on the head, and doesn’t figure if the fluttering in the upper part of her body is due Lena being on top of her, or because her true ribs from three to six are probably, irretrievably and utterly broken.</p><p> </p><p>But when Lena speaks, the fervour moves to the south of her face and to the north of her pelvis, and Kara is placated.  Absolutely, irretrievably and utterly fucked. </p><p> </p><p>"Your eyes are <em> really </em>blue," Lena whispers, and Kara is invaded by a vision where were she to bend her neck a few inches forward and stretch her lips, perhaps... </p><p> </p><p>"Got them from my daddy."</p><p>
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</p><p>Kara follows through and they wind up watching that boring movie she suggested, both sitting on either end of the couch that has acted as a bed for them on some nights, and she is fine with the fact that she's not wrapped around Lena's side like a boa constrictor. </p><p> </p><p>Except she hates it.  </p><p> </p><p>The evening took an uncomfortable turn after Kara pulled a ninja move and was a heroic springboard for Lena's fall. And it shouldn't be that way, she just wants Lena to rake her hands through her scalp and run her warm hands under her shirt.</p><p> </p><p>"Where are you going?" Lena blurts out, launching her arm over the back of the sofa. Kara halts where she is about to disappear out of the living room, and looks over her shoulder to see her, fidgeting in her seat. </p><p> </p><p>"I want to meditate before we go to sleep.”</p><p> </p><p>"Okay."</p><p> </p><p>"Wanna come with me?” It is a hasty offer that weights much more to her than she lets on with the disengaged way it’s asked. Kara needs to tear down the wall imposed on them in the last few hours, and she will skin herself bare if that is what it takes.</p><p> </p><p>"I don't want to impose."</p><p> </p><p>"You wouldn't. I'd like it if you came with me, in fact." The strings that map out her blood vessels light up like a Christmas tree when Lena nods, and the warmth of the light possesses her from inside out.</p><p> </p><p>At night, with the twin lights of the moons, the gazebo looks completely different as Rao's last glimpse rises faintly into the sky. Cobalt reflections bathe the air, flames flickering after Kara fires up the gas torches hanging from the ceiling.</p><p> </p><p>Lena stands on the doorway, bashful and withdrawn as she fears overstepping, letting the cold night wind sneak in, and Kara beckons her to follow with a nudge of her chin, the door sliding close behind them with a deafeningly low click. It feels like she’s been locked in a lion's cage.</p><p> </p><p>"This is the sanctuary where we practiced <em> Raoism</em>," Kara confesses, circling the bar where the threads hang, not daring to come any closer. "I do a bit of meditation when I come here at night because I cannot practice the religion if Rao is not up there.”</p><p> </p><p>"There’s no landscape here that isn’t breathtaking." Lena marvels at the view, even when it is an infinite line of treetops receiving the sacrament of moonlight.</p><p> </p><p>“It’s beautiful.” Kara gazes at her, puffing out her chest with pride at green eyes bathed in wonder. "The goal of meditating with closed eyes is affected when this kind of view is tempting you," she states, gaze still on her. </p><p> </p><p>Making a bee line, Lena stands right beside her, resting her left arm on the railing and turning her body ninety degrees to the right to steal a glance at Kara, then at the bar. "What are these?" She gestures toward the thin blue strings that rest on the altar, each separated from the other by three inches.</p><p> </p><p>"Threads of Fate,” Kara explains, taking the one in the near corner between her thumb and index finger, and lifting it so Lena has to look up. "Those are strands of kryptium, one of our metals. Blow it."</p><p> </p><p>"What?"</p><p> </p><p>"Blow the strand."</p><p> </p><p>"Why would I do that?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara laughs, coaxing her. "Just do it." The warm gust of wind reaches her face, too, and Kara blinks and opens her eyes to see the thread wobbling from side to side by the aeolian impulse. She then places the thread in Lena's hand, inert and controllable. "Now, try to wrap it around your fingers." She directs, watching Lena try and fail.</p><p> </p><p>"How the fuck," Lena growls under her breath. She tries again, picking it from one end, going to tie it around her fingers but the piece of fiber doesn't budge. Her forehead wrinkles into a lovely frown as she insists on bending the metal that seconds ago was malleable at her whim. </p><p> </p><p>"Awesome, right? It's a whole kinetic thing, but this was one of my favorite parts of coming here. Sadly, there's nothing like it on earth.”</p><p> </p><p>"What did you use them for?"</p><p> </p><p>"Prayers and petitions. Dad wasn't a big believer in this tradition, but Mom was, and I think the idea is pretty wholesome and harmless.” Her fingers trace the creases of Lena's palm, the heart line where the thread made its home. "You offer a Thread for any situation you need to be attended, and request Rao to shine its light on it to clear the way.”</p><p> </p><p>The hand that Lena isn’t clutching like a lifeline around the allegory of destiny points back to the rest of strings. "I guess each one is for different things," she probs, genuinely curious.</p><p> </p><p>"They are. I come to this place every two days, so six different prayers since we got here.” She offers an easy answer, pausing when the knowledge of who they are for takes longer to reach her than it should. "The first one is for Alex and Eliza, the second is for Kelly and James–" fingers bounce between empty spaces–"then there are the wise Martians, and our very Coluan-Naltorian duo, Brainy and Nia. The last is for Kal, Lois and my nephew Jon.”  </p><p> </p><p>Lena nods and swallows, her gaze dropping to the lifeline that pulses in her hands. "And this one?"</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> "Us."  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>"<em>Oh</em>."</p><p> </p><p>The admission pressures them down the polished ground, and that single piece of thread comes alive to wrap itself around Kara’s unsuspecting neck to tighten, cutting off all airways and leaving her heaving for life. But it is the truth. She spent most part of the morning kneeling and praying for the one deity she has ever given a second thought to give them a second chance, begging for it to be their pilot as they enter uncharted waters in search for the holy light at the end of it all. </p><p> </p><p>And if it is the peak of her honesty that anchors them down in a static scene, be it, for Kara would willingly rip her heart out of her chest and present it to Lena in a crystal ball as a vow of prominent commitment. A promise to try one more time, to make sure this is when they make it right.</p><p> </p><p>"I– I..." Kara exhales, flames licking the apple of her cheeks, her ears and neck. "Having you back means the world to me. We're halfway there, but Lena, I keep hoping that everything works out between us because I don't think I can live without–”</p><p> </p><p>She is once again interrupted by the sweetest of surprises, and chokes on her words when Lena stands tall on the tip of her boots to crash their lips together without any warning, leaving Kara with eyes wide open and heart threatening to, in fact, jump out of her chest and run to Lena, to run home. </p><p> </p><p>Lena tastes of the hot chocolate they had while the film played in the back of their minds. She’s the fresh breath of air of a dream Kara has let sleep for ages, a titan that breaks out of hibernation to burst through her seams, destroying and rebuilding Kara in a single trace of her tongue on the soft arc of her lips, and an obsolete moan escapes one of them as proof they’re awake at last. Her hands yearn to find a pole to hold on to, and the curve of Lena's waist perpetuates a perfect rest, the skin of her hip bone hot as Kara’s fingers slip under the shirt she's wearing—as hot as the Thread of Fate when it brushes her neck after Lena circles her arms around her.</p><p> </p><p>"Wait." Pulling away from the desperate pout that follows her hurts, but it is a necessary evil as the accusation of profanity rushes back to her mind. Green eyes are now black in the reflection of the moons, and Kara is desperate to meet her halfway once more. "Wait a sec– Rao may still be watching us."  </p><p> </p><p>"Are you for real?" Lena freezes, making a hoarse sound when Kara nods, dead-serious. Her palms slide down the tendons of her neck and trip to a stop on the lapels of her robe, pulling hard until the distance that keeps them apart holds challenge to the width of the thread that started it all and now lies abandoned on the altar, and she whispers against Kara’s lips, "you know where your room is.”</p><p> </p><p>Trusting her senses is a difficult task when they are being invaded by Lena arching her back to fit in with Kara's solid planes, and crashing through the glass door of the gazebo is a harbinger of how things are bound to evolve.</p><p> </p><p>On a typical night, running through the halls when her parents were waiting in her room to read her a story before going to bed, it took Kara a solid twenty-seven seconds to make the race from the balcony to the comfort of her bed. But stumbling, her footsteps tangling with Lena's as she walks backwards with Kara's momentum pushing her body, colliding against walls and wrong doors as eager hands undo the rows of buttons of her gown and slip clothes down flushed shoulders and torsos, leaving trails of clothes in the empty hallway, it takes forever to make it through the door to Kara's room. </p><p> </p><p>Standing behind Lena, hips latching onto the curve of her rear, Kara's adept moves untie the knot that holds Lena's trousers in place, the garment skimming on the soft skin of her legs followed by a thud she cannot hear under the blood drumming in her ears. She draws a string of wet kisses from her shoulder to her pulse point, tongue darting out to trace the shell of her ear before capturing and nibbling on it.</p><p> </p><p>"We should talk before we do this," Lena whimpers, yielding her neck to grant access for Kara's attacks.</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, we should."</p><p> </p><p>"There’s so much to discuss, and having sex is not the way."</p><p> </p><p>"So many things to– to discuss." Mumbling one last time against stark-white skin, Kara twirls Lena around and presses their foreheads together. Her hand ascends to the clasp of her bra, the click nailing her to the idea that this is going to happen.</p><p> </p><p>"But we are responsible adults with needs, and we trust each other to do this.” Kara wants to intervene—she has been stuck in a dry spell for much longer than two weeks, and has been in a Lena withdrawal for far longer—but she doesn't, and prefers to remain silent. "Say it back," Lena orders, and detaches herself from her body to attack her belt buckle and launch it into exile. </p><p> </p><p>"I– I want to… please–” </p><p> </p><p>Kara has always known that Lena is gorgeous inside and out, but what's in between is… beyond stunning. </p><p> </p><p>Her mouth is a dry desert, and Kara is an ocean below her hips, mesmerized by the sight of her friend, stripped down to nothing except panties she is desperate to remove, and hooded eyes. Lena is curves and dips in the right places, ample breasts that land up on straining pink nipples Kara rolls between her fingers.</p><p> </p><p>The back of Lena's knees hit the edge of the bed, and both plummet down as they lose sense of gravity, Kara using her core strength to brace herself, biting a plump lip when Lena opens her mouth in a silent scream due the heat emanating from the apex of her own legs being met by Kara’s chiseled torso nestled between them. </p><p> </p><p>"Up," she commands, getting on her knees and hooking her thumbs on the elastic of Lena's underwear, throwing the garment back and repeating the same process with her own clothes. Settling back into her nest between legs parted wide open, moaning as slick heat drags on the skin of her navel, Kara maps the edges of newly exposed skin. "Never seen anything more beautiful than you, so ready for me." </p><p> </p><p>Lena's hips shot up in compulsive response, and the room is faithful witness to the choked-out moan that comes after a hand travels south and two of Kara’s long digits thrust into her in a swift stroke, pumping in and out with expert care as Lena throws her head back, eyes shut tight with the pleasure of being filled by her hands.</p><p> </p><p>"<em>Harder</em>," Lena challenges in her ear, drawing her into a kiss before pushing her head down, demanding attention on her heaving chest, and the tongue that was once wrapped around Lena's, descends to do so around her nipple, scraping her teeth over the fleshy bud and pulling out more of the sounds that Kara has begun to consider the gospel she wants at her funeral, a death induced by Lena's clenched walls fluttering on her fingers. </p><p> </p><p>She is trying to make amends, but if someone asks how Kara expected their night to go, answers would have pointed to the opposite place. Not even close to where Lena is squirming underneath her, overstimulated from the ministrations of her thumb firm on her clit.</p><p> </p><p>That evening, the atmosphere became heavy due to the pull of unquenched attraction, and an invisible fence had been raised for a few hours to keep apart, but somehow they came out of it stronger. </p><p> </p><p>As they always do.</p><p> </p><p>"God, you feel <em> so </em> good." Lena's whines are shaky, feminine and high-pitched, and the palm of her hand is a permanent fixture that coaxes Kara to please her, attached to the flesh of her chest that she kisses and nibbles, insistent and tender, to soothe the angry red marks that blooms where her lips suck. </p><p> </p><p>"You– you have no idea," Kara pants, struggling with the excessive strain of her muscles ramming Lena into the mattress, the last thing she could have imagined doing on an Argo-esque night.</p><p> </p><p>But at the same time, it's the last piece of the puzzle falling into place. A perfect conclusion, a logical step up the stairway to heaven that is for Kara to be with Lena. It's as if all those years, days, hours they've spent together—learning to read their lines until there's no one more expert in the field of each other than themselves—are sacred apologists to the thawed corners of their imperfections.</p><p> </p><p>Lena sighs sweet reassurances for Kara, a light that never leaves her side and is a bright star as she navigates the darkness of her own thoughts, murky waves that churn up everything she knows.</p><p> </p><p>And Lena, she realizes, is her <em> yellow </em> sun in the way that letting herself be bathed by her essence makes Kara invincible, blinds her with the brightness of the G-type star she’s claiming to but cannot see under the scarlet hues of a sun that once belonged with her.</p><p> </p><p>Lena is flying home after a bad day, and the calm of the cerulean sky after a thunderstorm that messes with Kara’s overstimulated senses. She is how many moons Kara can name, the birth of a supernova, the autumnal equinox that happens to take place the same day of her birthday, and all the cosmic events that Kara didn’t get to see while she was suspended in outer space on a twenty-four year dark night, driven by tangled astral webs trying to find a place to discard the invading pod.</p><p> </p><p>For Kara, Lena is opening her eyes for the first time after being asleep for so long. And she's about to start crying because, in retrospect, this woman is all her dreams come true. </p><p>She had sworn that she would never have true love, that the chance to find her perfect match had drifted away with the ashes of her lost world, among everything else. But being there now, holding Lena close to her racing heart, Kara is sure that she has never been more in love and–</p><p> </p><p>Oh.</p><p> </p><p><em> Oh. </em> </p><p> </p><p>That's what it is.</p><p> </p><p>Kara, amidst the chaos, fell in love with Lena.</p><p> </p><p>Funny, isn't it? How the question mark she's been carrying like a cross ever since Lena walked out on her at the Fortress, leaving Kara sobbing and bleeding out of the black hole she left when she took her heart with her, wondering why everything hurt so much, is solved within seconds and the solution leaves her reeling on a cliff she doesn't know whether to jump off, even if all arrowheads are pointing to do so.</p><p> </p><p>"Don't you dare stop," Lena pleads, digging fingers in the defined muscles of her back. </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I'm having a cataclysmic epiphany here, your orgasm can wait. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>The pull of attraction of the first few weeks, the genuine desire to get to know her during the first few months, the benevolent love that drives her to protect Lena so fiercely after many years. It's all the answer she needs, and she jumps off the cliff as Lena reaches the edge, moaning and convulsing as Kara's hand is bathed in the gushes of her efforts. </p><p> </p><p>A butterfly effect, she baptizes the moment, because she never imagined that the mundane task of tagging along with her cousin for an article was the lead she needed on her way to meet the best thing that has ever happened to her.  </p><p> </p><p>Kara comes hard, and comes to the realization that the woman under her is probably the only person in the traceable universe she would put above everything else. </p><p> </p><p>"It's okay, darling," Lena coos as tears soak the spot on her neck where Kara is hiding, defeated by the brute force of the asteroid she's been hit with. Tender hands lift her head, and Lena kisses her eyelids. "I <em> know</em>, it's okay."</p><p>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>1. this chapter was soo much fun to write, i genuinely hope you enjoyed it because the next one is going to be a bumpy ride.</p><p>2. i hope y'all had the most amazing holidays (be it hanukkah, christmas, yule, ramadan, kwanzaa, or whichever ones you celebrate). happy new year dear, wonderful friends, thanks for being part of my family for another long, trying year. may your 2021 be filled with nothing but health, joy and so much love. </p><p>3. supercorp endgame for the culture.</p><p>for what's left of 2020, peace out.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. five nights of misery</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>the moment is right, and it's time for kara and lena to have a very much needed conversation.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>trigger warnings:</p><p>mentions of death, blood, implied self-harm</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>There’s something about the mystical poetry behind being invulnerable in an advantageous percentage—a balance that grants Kara with sporadic fear, reserved for the well-being of her loved ones, never worrying about the sake of her own welfare, only ticking down the quite few times life is unfortunate and slashes her with the claws of a jade tinted nemesis. </p><p> </p><p>However, it’s not genuine humility that butts Kara to admit she’s had her fair share of close calls and dreadful scares. The release of the fiery reluctance she’s grasped for so long is ignited when life or death situations dig deep into her heart and seek out to plant a rotten seed to let it harvest, spoiling everything in its path. </p><p> </p><p>Fear comes in the flashing lights of the doomed Flight 237 where a seat was taken by her sister, Kara dripping wet with salt water that weighed on her clothes as she stood in the wings of an aircraft that was destined to touch down in Swiss territory but instead landed her the opportunity of donning the emblematic scarlet mantle that changed her life. It comes in the shape of the beach house she grew up in and her doppelganger’s trespassing, set to endanger Eliza’s life. In the rushed blink of an eye, where everyone she met in this afterlife becomes another name and spot sitting high in her inherited mausoleum. It comes in the hysteria that seeps into her heart and soaks her in agony as she carries the heiress of her enemy family tree out of impending hazard, leaving Kara alone and afflicted with neurosis even hours later, when she knows Lena is safe and sound in the fortress that is her home.</p><p> </p><p>She faces, on a daily basis, a large parade of beings that blunder and fail to damage her moral core as Kara wields the score of instigators she’s belted with such proficiency, no one could ever dare to insinuate she hasn’t mastered the craft of parading the lack of vulnerability conceded by the overexposure to solar radiation. All in all, the compendium of her greatest fears is far away from rounding the corner. Kara can stick to the serenity she indulges most days of a week. </p><p> </p><p>“How do you want your eggs?” Piercing through silence, Lena questions, her back to Kara as she skims along the edges of the kitchen sink.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Nothing terrifies her the way Lena Luthor does. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>She can’t even be defined as dangerous, not closer to being a volatile reactive than she is to a proactive solution. Where Kara is a jumbled mess of unfinished thoughts, Lena is a cool headed power cell as she herds across a route of genuine goodness, smudged by a couple of questionable decisions. </p><p> </p><p>From day one, back on top of the Luthor bastion, Kara realised Lena wasn’t a damsel in distress shouting for the local caped crusader to materialize out of thin air and rescue her, but rather the hero in disguise lurking in the quiet shadows of night to shine bright on her own terms; fierce, intelligent, sensitive and kind to a cause—an outstanding specimen, the first individual to really steal all of Kara’s attention after she had gotten used to the common denominator that averageness seemed to be among the human species.</p><p> </p><p>The cloudless morning Kara met her, she was mesmerised, awestruck and enamoured with the gorgeous lady with a quick wit her family warned about time after time. And, in the same fashion, it’s ludicrous to deny she didn’t feel intimidated—unable to take her eyes away and a step forward to display her usual extroverted self, stranded on the generic flaw of being rooted to the spot, the weight of bones that could crack the foundations of an entire civilisation back to oblivion quaking under the greenish beam of haunting eyes.</p><p> </p><p>Kara Danvers born <em> Zor-El </em>, credulity her birthright, let prejudices and social vitriol stride past her, and extended her trust for Lena to reach without effort. </p><p> </p><p>Thus, ordinarily logical step, Lena Luthor and having fallen in love with her is the most frightening experience she’s ever lived in the past years. </p><p> </p><p>For all the time she spends pondering, the delivery of speech is shaky and Kara makes an utter fool of herself. “Cooked?”</p><p> </p><p>“Filling your plate with breathing chicks wasn’t exactly on my plans, <em> darling </em>.” Lena chuckles, and there’s the need for Kara to step back into their conversation and make sure the pet name it’s only a lighthearted jab and not the prelude to another scorpion sting.</p><p> </p><p>“Uh, y’know, sunny side up?” she swallows, dropping the last piece of a shredded napkin on the smooth surface, placing one hand on top of the other. </p><p> </p><p>“Again? I get that we don’t have the widest variation on meals around here, but...”</p><p> </p><p>Gnawing at the corner of her lip, right where the phantom of a bruise is taking its last breaths, Kara curls her shoulders inwards and says, “I like them that way.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena offers the awaited mercy and turns on her bare heels, the steel of the spatula she waves around casting an uncomfortable silver reflection at Kara’s dazed eyes. ”Enough to eat the same thing for a whole week?” </p><p> </p><p>“I’m one for commitment.” The roll of green eyes she gets in exchange is a brief victory, and Kara grins, arms sliding across the cold marble to reach for another napkin.</p><p> </p><p>“What if I–“ comes Lena’s proposition, a saccharine intonation dripping from cherry-stained lips–“make toast instead and squeeze some juice from the fruits you got yesterday?” She dries her hands on the cloth draped over her shoulder, milky thighs enticing and endless as she leans back on her elbows, sporting one of Kara’s shirts—seemingly her favourite token from that fateful night.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> That night.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>For a stretch of time that takes such a small portion of the day, where most part of it her closed eyes forbid seeing the course of that threatening period, she realizes <em> that night </em> has seized all of her waking thoughts, and there are vignettes tattooed on the inside of Kara’s eyelids, permanent as she tries to escape a memory that she would, otherwise, love to have sealed in ink on the left side of her chest.</p><p> </p><p>She had sex with Lena, her best friend. Her best friend whom she is apparently in love with.</p><p> </p><p>Kara and Lena had sex. Passionate, mindblowing sex that freed them when the first crimson waves made an appereance, fully spent and gasping for air while trying to find sleep and put their slack limbs to rest. And Kara, bless her heart, would never want to forget the sight—pins and needles that cleave her body in half, a part of her becoming fugitive and leaving her yearning to find herself in the folds of previously foreign territory—if it wasn’t for what transpired.</p><p> </p><p>What had begun as a bona fide intervention, Kara disclosing the purpose of the Threads of Fate and baring yet another piece of her soul with the sole intention of handing it to Lena, ended in all of her naked and the phantom sensation of Lena’s mellow body tucked snug underneath hers sending electric shocks across her spine, successful, too, in lodging a barrier between her lungs and windpipes. </p><p> </p><p>The aftershock still routes the tremor in her hands from an abstinence she never thought she would have to abstain from.</p><p> </p><p>If that isn't enough to prompt a response detached from rational logic, the penny dropped and fettered her to the bedpost, tied her to the uncharted land that mapped Lena’s silhouette, and to top it all off—apparently, Kara is the only one that comes easily when it comes to Lena—she saw daylight, and the blazing heat spelled in bright letter a long-awaited revelation. </p><p> </p><p>She <em> is </em>in love with Lena.</p><p> </p><p>That knowledgement, adjoined to the sweet sounds that keep beating in her eardrums like a familiar tune, the angry-red crescent tracks embedded on her back and the safety net in a dome of fervent warmth in Lena's shaky arms, is a bucket of spilled information that Kara has to mop up along with the tears born from the depths of uncertainty.</p><p> </p><p>Though it is Lena who has always been there to guide her, to provide a shoulder and words of wisdom when her path is clouded, the occasion when she may need her most, is the first where Kara can't rely on her services. She has no idea what the trigger was, but Lena has been ignoring what happened, sweeping the event under a metaphorical rug as if it was a crime of passion to be forgotten, the last straw for her sanity to overflow. </p><p> </p><p>"You gotta eat something too, please?" the plea comes like that of a frightened child after shattering a parent’s favorite vase, and the only bait for Kara to arise from her hunchbacked shell is the plate Lena sets down in front of her.</p><p> </p><p>"I made porridge before you woke up," Lena assures her, “I would’ve saved you some but I made it with water,” she adds as explanation after she sees the start of a menacing pout start to quiver on Kara’s lips, and props her lower back against the impromptu breakfast-lunch-dinner table, hands cradling a mug wafting the pungent steam of the Oregus Plant. </p><p> </p><p>“Yucky.”</p><p> </p><p>“That’s exactly what I thought you’d said.”</p><p> </p><p>“And I don’t regret any second of it. You should’ve woken me–”</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, in a billion years, maybe. You sleep like the dead.”</p><p> </p><p>"Guilty as charged, but a <em> Kara, dear, is food time </em> is enough to get me outta bed in record time.” She stabs a slice of a fair compatriot to dragon fruit and carries it to her parted lips, wiping the juice off her chin with the inner cuff of her sleeve. “You’ve been MIA these days, going rogue on me, Luthor?” <em> MIA </em>ending up being the adept term to abbreviate not boa-constricting Kara in their sleep, nor brushing their teeth together and venturing down the stairs hand in hand as they lay their breakfasts and plans for the day on the table. But it’s okay, Kara can work with MIA.  </p><p> </p><p>"Your father's lab is a thousand times more advanced than any we have back on–" she halts, studying the dregs of her tea with furrowed brows–"where we come from." </p><p> </p><p>"If you up to, I can tag along and show you–"</p><p> </p><p>"No! It's not necessary– how's work at the greenhouse coming up, anyways? You always seem to vanish when it’s garden day." </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I wouldn't disappear if you'd talk to me. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Kara chews and savours her options, deciding to follow the path Lena dictates. "Dandy, thanks. No, honestly, mom loved taking care of her green clique, and she– it kind of grew on me, y’know? I’m hooked.” She nods, a nostalgic grin blooming on her face as she brushes wheat crumbs from her clothes and uses her fist to cover her mouth on the following bite. </p><p> </p><p>Having so much free time to herself, Kara has resorted to digging through her memory for what few memories of her previous life she can scrap, rejoicing in one starring her mother with gloves full of dirt and a wide brim sun hat covering half her face from the day’s light, the lopsided beam that Kara is scion to always firm on place as she traced her thumb over Kara's cheek and attempted to tame her wild curls. </p><p> </p><p>Being there, a rather ambiguous itinerary with no fixed routine, she adopts that hobby as an immediate antidote to the poisonous pull of her recently-promoted-to-bedmate best friend.</p><p> </p><p>While Lena huddles in the lab, doing Rao knows what, Kara makes the most of the spare time to pamper the crops that each morning welcome her with joyous whistles and open roots, singing as she walks in with an energy matched only by their former caretaker. She can't complain, the singing flowers are rather docile as she tends to their needs—thick, bright petals dancing to the slow tempo of the tune it produces, lulling Kara into a peaceful stupor. There's a reason they will always be an all-time favorite. </p><p> </p><p>"I've been meaning to ask you," Lena utters, inching closer on her elbows. </p><p> </p><p>Her first reaction is to try and avert her eyes as the collar of Lena’s shirt—actually hers—dips low, but the damage is done and a red flush splotches the apple of her cheeks at the visual reminder of purplish evidence still permeating Lena's chest. "Shoot." </p><p> </p><p>"A couple of days ago when I was out for a walk, I found a wide bush with white flowers that made this kind of... sound? Are those the same ones I heard in the greenhouse?"</p><p> </p><p>"Yup, those would be the singer flowers. Kryptonian pride." Kara goads, ankle sneaking closer and closer to the barstool Lena inhabits now.</p><p> </p><p>"They're quite similar to plumerias." Glancing above Kara's shoulder, she makes the comparison and avoiding the depths of ocean blue, mutters, "you once mentioned they reminded you of your mother." </p><p> </p><p>Lena’s heavy gaze darts a few inches to the right to fall upon Kara's, crinkled and sparkling after, a few seconds staring at each other, a delighted smile possesses her face and lights up the room with its pink and red hues of adoration. </p><p> </p><p>It's good to know Lena <em> remembers </em>. That such a haphazard annotation was important enough to print a footnote and use it years later.</p><p> </p><p>"Those were her favourites." Her voice is a quiet hush, the wide grin tampering down to a serene curl of her lips. “Dinner nights were never a quiet affair, mom had a zoo of singer flowers back at the dining room. It was a whole show.”</p><p> </p><p>"We should try it, actually eating in the dining room, not here in this… massive kitchen bar.” Jet black locks fall inert as Lena threads a hand through her hair, waving its twin dismissively after Kara’s offer of a bite, flushing as they both see it for what it is. A tongue-tied token of appreciation. “On the other hand, I suppose it must feel good, knowing you still have a piece of her here with you." Her smile is soft and genuine as her head tilts slightly, like if summoned by the gravity force of Kara’s own. </p><p> </p><p>This is the first glimpse of her caring Lena, ready for honest displays of affection for Kara no matter the day or time, and she's about to plunge and snatch the opportunity to dig into Lena’s current of thoughts, but she drops the mask faster than Kara can voice her intentions.</p><p> </p><p>"You know where to find me." </p><p> </p><p>A click of her tongue. "Ditto."</p><p> </p><p>The clang of the mug against the dishwasher draws her out of reverie, and the joints in her knuckles take the shadow of snow as she clutches polished edges to avoid trailing after Lena when her shirt rises dangerously high up her thighs. She manages not to chase Lena like a dog its owner, because Kara remembers the morning after, and the side where the promise of finding Lena's exhausted reminiscences lay its head, devoid of any motion—sand coloured crumpled sheets braving the last waft of Lena’s natural scent replaced the scene where Kara longed to be dazzled by the glow of her eyes as soon as she awoke. </p><p> </p><p>It was a shame, for sure, that Kara rose under a blanket of thick, gray clouds, both Rao's and Lena's safety nowhere to be felt, hiding from the distress calls that rang out of her hoarse throat after proclaiming undying love all through late night and early morning. </p><p> </p><p>After a few lonely bites, breakfast tastes of sandpaper, and Kara has to drop the nutrient fuel before the fluttering in her stomach returns everything her appetite allows her to eat. Taking great solace in the whirring of the dishwasher as it retracts from its place, all the used china being swallowed behind her back, the thought of her following move crosses Kara’s mind. </p><p> </p><p>The first few hours of lighting day have passed, and it seems to be a profitable one after nearly a week of waking up to cold blizzards and going to sleep in fierce storms, Rao resumes some of its glare, still dim but surrendering the penumbra as if trying to give her breathing room.</p><p> </p><p>Putting on her boots and going out to explore the area to see how far this piece of reality reaches sounds like an appealing option, it's what she's wanted to find out in a while. If the End Line limits them to the Zor-El home, the Fire Falls and a good chunk of the Scarlet Jungle, or if there's a chance that some of Krypton's most wonderful landmarks are stuck along with them in the map of this absurd dimensional vacay, but she decides once again to stay and sweat the day away in the garden, hanging on to the hope that Lena may need her so she can be nearby in case the time comes. </p><p> </p><p>A metaphorical clock carries out unforgivable rounds and Kara perpetuates a flesh heap under the grahu dome of the glasshouse even after Koron and Mithen begin their seventeenth act.  The unique chance where she abandons the pruners and her gloves is presented by a presence beyond the wooden bridge, jade eyes watching her through the door that demarcates the garden from the rest of the mansion, Lena disappearing into the maze of grass as soon as their gazes cross. </p><p> </p><p>The plate piled at the edge of the rectangular pot at the threshold ventures close to being a inmate's reward after accomplishing tasks, and her sigh takes so much of her that she has to grab hold of the dragon’s blood tree to keep from vanishing when black dots creep into her view, energy utterly absorbed after a whole day working on the scraps of a cut short breakfast. </p><p> </p><p>"Holy light of Rao!" she squeals, eyes snapping open as the tingle of a climbing plant begins to creep up her wrist, squeezing hard enough to leave mark. "Son of a monkey... shot, shot, <em> shot!" </em> Kara struggles against the Heather Vines, chunky as they spin and squeeze harder, rendering her nimble fingers useless when they try to free her hand. </p><p> </p><p>She sees the solution to her problem, but it’s out of reach and Kara has to strain her body a few inches to grab the dish Lena had left there minutes earlier, her stomach churning inside as a sign of animosity as Kara throws the food to the ground and smashes the plate against the potted plant, using the makeshift weapon to rip her attacker in apart. The task proves to be more difficult than previously thought, vines showing strength Kara didn’t account earlier, but the sharpness of the severed porcelain and the brute force of her muscles as she counteracts grant Kara with triumph, even if she ends up landing on her rear from the loss of tension between her appendage and the menacing plant, ruining further her white trousers.</p><p> </p><p>Lying there for the time it takes her to calm her heaving chest and regaining sensation in her hand, Kara counts the path stars draw as they orbit the yellowish satellites, eyes fluttering closed and staying that way after hearing footsteps of an unexpected visitor stop near her. </p><p> </p><p>Lena takes a seat on one of the benches located to the side, deliberately taking her time to speak, tormenting Kara even more. "I was going to warn you about those, but I thought you'd be aware," she finally concedes, "are you okay?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara uses her healthy forearm to cover her face, disguising the lone tear of frustration that slides down her temple and dampens her hairline. “Peachy.”</p><p> </p><p>She's fine, that's for sure. Kara Danvers does a stellar performance of being <em> fine </em> . If only, a little confused beyond measure because one second there was this sombré voice shouting in her ear to <em> please be careful or I’ll sock you right in the face</em>, and the next Kara is being locked in, what had once been a dream, turned a sempiternal nightmare. Now, the permanent ache in her chest throbs harder the second she wakes up, and no matter how many distractions she finds to lessen it, it's impossible not to wish to dig her fingers into saturated earth, nailing herself into it to prevent someone else taking her world and her home away, once again. Confused, and at the same time wanting to flee this place, to return to the arms of that person she’s sure is out there waiting for her and cry nonstop as she relives with them the fact that she now remembers the distinct smell of her father's cologne, the Nightwing's hooting and that <em> Gronya </em>is the name of her favorite spices when cooking alongside Kellex for a fest.</p><p> </p><p>Tired. <em> Exhausted </em>, even, and perpetually confused. </p><p> </p><p>Today marks the fifth day she hasn't been able to establish a decent conversation with Lena, she avoids Kara the second conversation takes a more serious detour in dialogue. </p><p> </p><p>They made love, yes, and… Kara can count on the fingers of one hand the amount of times she's indulged to such a magnitude of unadulterated happiness, but that feeling is drowned out by a tsunami of avoidance where Lena is the waves and she's the innocent bystander that attempts and fails to surf through the madness of this goddess’s silent might. </p><p> </p><p>But, deeper down, right next to her heart pumping blood to keep the rest of her body and soul alive, there's a sting where she managed to convince herself that this whole situation has a damned genesis, and Lena doesn't know how to break the news to her, but it's just not in her to reciprocate what they both found out that fateful night. </p><p> </p><p>Kara is sure she knows too, hearing Lena mumbling <em> it’s okay </em>it’s not a figment of her imagination, but the lifeline she clings to. And, as many fractures as they've gone through and overcome, it breaks her heart to think of this being the thing that finally shatters their already fragile relationship. </p><p> </p><p>That would wreck Kara.</p><p> </p><p>She wants to turn back time, when she had her best friend being her best friend and not some kind of outlaw in her homeland.</p><p> </p><p>Nevertheless, burdens are crosses to bear alone, and she does what she knows best, plastering a smile on her face and swallowing the lump in her throat as she glances at Lena, scratching the bronze layer of rust covering the armrest of the hardwood bench with her thumbnail. </p><p> </p><p>"Just… got caught by surprise. Sorry about the food, my belly is already making me feel guilty enough." She blows a breath, jumping to her feet, cracking her knuckles before sliding her hands down the back of her pants. Food scraps are still scattered on the floor, but she decides to deal with it when there's no hammering in the back of her skull.</p><p> </p><p>"Hold on, where are you going?" Lena asks and hoisting from her seat to reach out, hurries to follow in her footsteps after Kara is quicker and dodges her. </p><p> </p><p>Kara lifts her chin, shoulders curving into a half shrug. "I’m drained, gonna– gonna call it a night."</p><p> </p><p>"So soon? It's barely even dark, and we have to fill you up before bed or you'll get grumpy. There's more food in the kitchen, we can use the mento-ray for a while or go meditate, if that's what you want."</p><p> </p><p>Kara freezes at the mention of the place that brought them to this reticent strife, and picks up the pace, leaving Lena behind, ignoring her puzzled look. "Hard pass, but thanks."</p><p> </p><p>A hot shower is all Kara needs to scrub the doubt and watch it down the drain, the scorching water untying the knots in her mind as the jets blast her aching muscles. Drowsy eyes and heavy limbs as she soaks in the encapsulated steam of the chamber, she feels for the towel and makes one last stop at the Rondor pod to let the Heather Vine scars fade from her pale skin, fishing for the most comfortable pajamas she can find, long-sleeved and smelling of freshly done laundry to cocoon in the comfort of them. </p><p> </p><p>The tranquil state of mind she manages to balance collapses when the door is shouldered open and the first thing her eyes lock on is Lena, sitting cross-legged in the middle of their bed, green eyes flitting upward at the sound of the glass sliding, as if she was waiting for that exact moment. </p><p> </p><p>Kara can’t suggest making camp in any other room this late at night without raising alarm bells for Lena, they are too in sync to notice the slightest change in learnt behaviours—the former knows it even if the latter ignores it. And, the last thing she is thinking of is adding a comment that strikes the match for an unwelcomed discussion.</p><p> </p><p>Lena’s gaze is a blazing trail for each step she takes, each heavier than the last as they form a turbulent path where Kara wanders around their room aimlessly, trying to decipher what her next move will be. By the time she plops down into bed to the soundtrack of a drizzle spitting on the window pane, she outweighs the infinite burdens planted on her shoulders.</p><p> </p><p>Lena is fiddling with her fingers in that particular way Kara finds endearing, an attempt to regain control over a situation that will get out of hand for both of them if they don't recover their footing soon, and Kara doesn't look down from the ceiling in fear that her urges will overcome her and drive her to cradle Lena's hands in hers to appease the thundering in her chest. </p><p> </p><p>It's quiet for a few long minutes, what used to be the patter of a drizzle gradually turning into the sound of coarse droplets crashing furiously against the transparent barrier dividing them from outer space, and the stillness is disturbed when Lena turns suddenly, her knee colliding with Kara's thigh. </p><p> </p><p>"How's your hand?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara doesn't open her eyes, but stretches her arm out for inspection, choking back a gasp as her wish comes true and hands smaller than hers cradle her palm gently. </p><p> </p><p>"Rondors work wonders. Shoulda paid more attention, tho." Kara kneads her eyes with her knuckles.</p><p> </p><p>"Are you okay?" </p><p> </p><p>"Got distracted for a second." </p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, that was implied earlier. But you, are <em> you </em>okay? I know being here hasn't been easy and I was wondering maybe–" </p><p> </p><p>"Have I done something to make you think I'm not?" </p><p> </p><p>Lena can be cynical, she knows, but that cynicism isn't directed at her often, so it takes her by surprise when she says, "I've been the one to bring up the topic of conversation these days, or else we'd be mummies all day long. You've barely eaten since–" </p><p> </p><p>“Since what?” Raising an eyebrow, she waits for Lena to catch her train of thought, but scoffs when she stays shut. "Is that what makes you think I'm not feeling well?" </p><p> </p><p>"You have a history of being a pathological liar, so don't try–" Lena wrinkles her nose, smoothing the frown on her forehead with her forefinger–"that was out of line, sorry."</p><p> </p><p>It’s a low blow, and they both know it, but it’s still the truth and Kara snatches the handed-on-a-silver-plate chance to tie some loose ends."No, go ahead and say it. Something tells me you’re dying to." </p><p> </p><p>"I already said that–"</p><p> </p><p>"If I am a liar, what does that make you, a bigot for omitted truths? You're as deep in this as I am." Kara can see the moment her words sit with Lena, and she slumps against the backrest to gain some leverage. </p><p> </p><p>"Don't you dare go down that road, I want to know how you’re feeling." </p><p> </p><p>"Then when, Lena? We keep putting off the inevitable and for what? There's nothing else we can do in this darn glass cage, <em> we </em>had sex and… was it a distraction for you?" she growls, allowing the anger that's been simmering in her stomach for days to blossom. "Were you so bored out of your mind and found no other solution than to drag me into this very bed and have your way with me, then forget about it?" </p><p> </p><p>"Of course not! I asked you, we both agreed." </p><p> </p><p>"It bothers me that that responsibility doesn't extend to the decency of remembering what happened." </p><p> </p><p>Lena rolls over on the mattress, creating much needed distance between them. "I do remember." </p><p> </p><p>"Do you? You can't blame me for acting differently when you're doing the same thing. I've had to tread carefully around you, and– for someone so vocal, you have been <em> so </em>quiet," Kara argues, waving her hands in the air to emphasize her perspective. </p><p> </p><p>The threshold they stand on is that of a doorway leading to a familiar place, but the dust gathering at the corners of their conversation proves that there is no known entity who would willingly dwell there. However, the key turns, and there is no light down the hall to blind them and make them forget.</p><p> </p><p>"C’mon! You started this and now you're–"</p><p> </p><p>"I've lost everything to you!" Lena finally snaps, at the same time a bolt of lightning does in the steady firmament above that spies on their conversation. "I've given it all to you! My trust, my patience. I lowered my defenses just to let you in, not knowing that you were this Trojan horse hiding a nightmare dressed as a daydream. The only thing that still belonged to me was my body, and I allowed you to take that away from me too. How do I know I'm not one of your experiments and you're holding a dagger behind your back to stab mine?" </p><p> </p><p>The pain in her chest returns, taking with it the spare air Kara had in her lungs as Lena stands up, shrinking into herself as her lip begins to tremble and a screen of tears layers her light irises. </p><p> </p><p>"All I have to offer is the promise that everything I did was to protect you." Kara throws her legs off the bed, ready in case she should approach. </p><p> </p><p>"That's not enough," Lena retorts, approaching the windowsill where some of the flowers Kara has cut lie. </p><p> </p><p>"It's all I have."</p><p> </p><p>"It is not enough! You keep saying you did it to protect me, protect me from what, exactly? I've been a Luthor many years before I met you, and that involves having enemies left and right." </p><p> </p><p>"Being close to Supergirl puts you in the line of fire, I wasn't planning on adding more people to the list." </p><p> </p><p>Lena snarls, a guttural sound growing from deep within her pent-up anger, and Kara is only slightly afraid of the inferno she can see reflected in her eyes. "Didn't you stop to think that leaving me in the dark was even more dangerous? You're Supergirl! and I'm a fucking Luthor, we have yet to be beaten when paired together." </p><p> </p><p>"And what good would that have done if I didn't have you? There is no mighty Supergirl without you by my side, this year has been proof of that." She sniffles, swallowing hard to push back the bay of tears welling in her eyes. </p><p> </p><p>"Stop doing that." </p><p> </p><p>"Doing what?"</p><p> </p><p>"Pretending your intentions weren't selfish," Lena spits and the heave wrenched clear off her chest translates into the deafening tone of her voice. "I'd believe you, if it weren't for how two-faced you've been." </p><p> </p><p>Kara ducks her head, drawing strength from the liquid tempest pouring mercilessly to confront this demon that has for so long tormented her, but then shuts her mouth when Lena continues. </p><p> </p><p>"You were always using the benevolence card, being both sides of a coin when all I asked for was for you to give back the same honesty I gave. How do you want me to trust your apology when you're an angel while wearing civilian clothes, but become the worst harasser of the last name I carry the second that red sigil is plastered on your chest? You can't go around pretending to be my friend, promising me things and offering me a rose-coloured world, only to walk out the door and back in with hand grenades."</p><p> </p><p>"Lena..."</p><p> </p><p>"It was you who doubted me and made someone else violate my privacy, it was <em> you </em>who turned against me any time it was convenient!" following the pattern of her voice, Lena breaks down in front of Kara. </p><p> </p><p>"You– you crucified me when I made kryptonite to save <em> our </em>friend! All the microaggressions I was subjected to because Supergirl couldn't decide if it was appropriate to trust a Luthor or not. Weren't you the one who told me that someone in my family shouldn't ask about your name? I was such an idiot, because I knew your name, and I knew every single thing about you and still… please stop being a coward and admit once and for all that you had the guts to lie to my face for so long just because you never cared."</p><p> </p><p>And it's as if an atom splits open and scatters Kara's entire essence on the floor to be trampled by Lena's desperate strides as she paces the room, because how dare she insinuate that she doesn't matter to her? When it is Lena Luthor, half of her heart, who fixed cracks in her soul that Kara wasn't even aware existed. </p><p> </p><p>At what point could that idea have been planted in her mind? But then Kara remembers, and regret floods what she once swore to herself she wouldn't let go to waste. </p><p> </p><p>"Of course I care! Holy light of Rao, I don't think I care about anyone else more than I care about you."  </p><p> </p><p>"Then what made you think lying to me for almost four years was okay?" Lena asks, face flushing as she clenches her jaw to stop the quivering of her lips and takes a step back, stumbling against the windowsill when she sees Kara approaching. "Four years in which I was precise in reminding you that, throughout my life, everyone I've come to trust has betrayed me. I had so much faith in you, god, I came to think you would be the one to–" she chokes back a sob–"why did you do that to me?"</p><p> </p><p>"I hurt you, I know," Kara says, blinking to get rid of the burning in her eyes, and tightens her fists at her sides, refraining from touching Lena. "It may not have been the right way and..." sighing, she looks up, dragging one hand down her face as the other rests on her waist, always steering clear from a mermaid’s luring call.</p><p> </p><p>"You were so far from the right way." Lena wipes the trail of tears sliding down her cheekbones, eyes tinged red. "<em> You </em> left me. <em> You </em> called me a villain after all the pain you gave me and just like that, you left. <em> You </em>promised I'd never lose you, but you disappeared the first moment my grief became too much for your martyr's guilt." </p><p> </p><p>Kara closes her eyes, flinching and almost stumbling on the bedpost as a clap of thunder decreases her coordination. "I tried a thousand ways to find a solution, and Mxyzptlk showed up and showed me so many realities where we– letting you go was the only way to keep from ruining us further." </p><p> </p><p>"I have no fucking idea who this Mxy-person is.” There's a flicker of bewilderment behind raw sadness and the disappointment swimming in her eyes, but that's no issue and Lena's features harden again in a split second. "I don't know who you've been talking to, or who you've been taking home, or what you've been up to this time we've been apart because you gave up on me and–"</p><p> </p><p>"–stop laying all the blame on me!" her voice cracks, so-called crocodile tears seizing her by the throat. She has to pull back to take a deep breath. "Lena, can’t you see how much you hurt me, too? You think this year was rainbows and daisies for me? I know I am the one who put us here, but when I tried to set things right and make amends for my mistakes, you– you tricked me!</p><p> </p><p>“You know I trust you blindly, and you used me to further your plans. We were okay, I made myself believe that we were fine and there was the slightest chance that I wouldn't lose you. But I did things for you that I would never do for someone else, you used my <em> martyr’s guilt </em> as a mean for your dishonest practices and–”</p><p> </p><p>“Non Nocere was created with the mere intention of doing good. I– I… it was meant to fix humanity.”  </p><p> </p><p>“I understand your motives, but the method? You declared war on me, and how could I ever fight you? You’re not my enemy, Lena, you’ll never be, and that’s what hurt the most,” Kara laments, spine bowed as she halts her speech to recover control. “I told you time after time, you’re well aware of how much I fear kryptonite… but you aimed the cannons at me and locked me up with the only thing in the world that could kill me." </p><p> </p><p>Slack-jawed and blanching, Lena's eyes widen and her lips part open, like she is realizing the gravity of her actions just now. "You know– Kara, you know I could never... thinking of you dying, that's not–"</p><p> </p><p>"The possibility never crossed your mind?" Licking her lips, she tastes her own tears. Her eyebrows furrow and she prods until she meets the tail of her diatribe. “Not too long ago, giving up sounded like a good idea, because I knew there wouldn’t be Supergirl or Kara to exist without the strength you unknowingly provide me with, and I cried like a baby for nights in a row thinking that– you gave me wings and clipped them when you decided to go ahead with your project. If it hadn't been for my friends–"</p><p> </p><p>"–that’s the thing, isn’t it? They had your back." Lena sighs, wiping inside the collar of her shirt, retreating into it to seek for breath in the walls caving in. "I killed my brother for you, Kara, but he came back to life and became the only person I could rely on. He's... Lex is a <em>monster</em>, and I– no one could– no one could heal next to him and his…”</p><p> </p><p>Lena’s residual fear is almost palpable, traveling down a rabbit hole where the crashing surface is a terror-induced tremor that shakes her to the core, and insurmountable ache is embedded in Kara’s bones at the thought of Lena, alone in the dark pit, trying to navigate uncertainty at the side of a sociopath who knew no emotions beyond hatred and spite. </p><p> </p><p>Kara had her people—but who had Lena? Who was there to cushion her fall when the found family that swore to protect her were the ones turning her in?</p><p> </p><p>She’s never felt more disgusted by the familial bond, the first to unravel when Lena stepped into an ill-lighted state. </p><p> </p><p>A finger jabbing into her chest brings her back to their unconscious reality, and her gaze drops to find the woman who deserves the world, shrugging off the weight of the curse that precedes her. Shrugging off the load of misery seems like an old friend that weaves Kara and Lena together these days.</p><p> </p><p>"I was of service to you and your little army well until you realized you couldn't control me. Actions stemming from my pain were the perfect excuse to stamp <em> villain </em>on my record, and the weapons I once helped you build are the same ones you now point at me." Her cheeks are hollowed where she bites the insides to hold back anguished sobs, and the digit she used to stab Kara evolves into two clenched fists that land without inflicting physical pain, even if her impulses are driven by agony. </p><p> </p><p>Desperation crumpling the features of her face, Kara tries to stop Lena by grabbing her forearms, but she shows plenty of strength for her drained energy. "Hey, <em> please stop,,</em>listen to me,” she coos, a whisperer’s song to a wounded kind.</p><p> </p><p>"Brainy, <em> our </em>friend, is almost dying for defending people who turned their backs on him.” Lena tries to shove her away, pushing Kara by the chest and propelling them backwards, but the edge of the bed collides against the back of her knees, preventing them from falling. Pale fingers clutch the area where her heartbeat thrums, Kara’s eyes flitting down to find raw devastation looking right back at her. “Did you all stop for a second to ask him what was going on? To worry about the reasons instead of punishing him, too? Of course your comity doesn’t stretch that far, and now we’re stuck here and I just don't know how he’s doing– aren’t you tired of losing people?" </p><p> </p><p>And that strikes a sore chord. If only because it's so close to being the truth. </p><p> </p><p>Maybe Lena hasn’t comprehended, doesn't know it, or doesn't suspect it, but that cross is the heaviest for Kara to carry, exhausting her to the point of bone-weariness from learning to love and lose the second she gets used to someone new. </p><p> </p><p>Panic spreads throughout her like a terminal disease, and she takes the wisest choice she’s made in a long time.</p><p> </p><p>Kara leaves before, once again, she is left. </p><p> </p><p>By the time the outcome of her outburst becomes impossible to ignore, she’s chasing away from her home, running and racing through broad bushes until the lack of air compresses her ribcage and she can no longer see past her tears and the deafening darkness that envelops her. Mud the colour of apricot coats her boots with each sinking step, but Kara draws strength from her heartache to reach a destination that has yet to be chosen. </p><p> </p><p>The night rumbles behind her, but she doesn’t dare to stop and take a look for fear of finding ghosts hunting her down the moment she pivots on her heels. There is a gray haze that blinds her, muscle memory coming in handy as her legs move by pure instinct, stopping when there is no more ground to cover and the End Line rests and laughs at her. </p><p> </p><p>There was a time, long, <em> long </em> ago, where Kara was able to draw her future picture without painting pain into the equation. She was destined to make Krypton a better place, proudly falling heir to a lab coat instead of a coat of arms. She was part of a legacy that exceeded average, she was meant to be great; <em> a legend born from grace. </em></p><p> </p><p>And now she's just sore from life's twists and turns.</p><p> </p><p>Kara was a child when she suffered her first great loss, innocent and confused when her parents woke her up in the middle of the night and rushed her into her favourite ship, tears of remorse welling up in their eyes as, along with her uncle and aunt, she was given the task of protecting the only blood relative that would be there in the aftermath of losing everything—the same one that is no closer than a stranger to her now—and then sent off to years and years of absolute nothingness, coming back to life in the light of loneliness.</p><p> </p><p>She grew accustomed to the idea of being reborn in a home where she was loved, in a home where she was accepted and understood in the face of her broken heart. </p><p> </p><p>That's when she learnt to love the Danvers. Kara hopes she never loses them.</p><p> </p><p>Kenny Li was fleeting, irrevocably paramount to her growth. He was a supernova, a star that lost its luster before her eyes, but his dense core didn’t allow Kara to step into darkness until long after his death. His joy, the lovely-almost-childlike curiosity and the way he was the first to understand why Kara was always gazing heavenward in search of something, anything... </p><p> </p><p>She learnt to love him, but Kara lost Kenny Li anyway.</p><p> </p><p>When she saw her mother's eyes in Astra's face, many years after Krypton, the hope she is ruled by shone again, not fully believing for fear that something could happen. And as emotionally detached as Kara managed to be, seeing her aunt's eyes flutter to a permanent seal as she held her in her arms,  havoc sweeping through, tore a piece out of her heart that she thought had already healed.</p><p> </p><p>She learnt to love someone she had once loved, but Kara lost her aunt anyway. </p><p> </p><p>A rough one happened when she least expected it, and the man who sacrificed much of himself and his life to give her a better second one was also gone. </p><p> </p><p>They lost Jeremiah, and it seemed to be Kara the trigger pulled in sync to ruin other people's happiness. </p><p> </p><p>She has lost lovers in battle and friends in war. Families have lost friends because Supergirl hasn’t arrived in time to save them. Supergirl has lost people who trusted her. It's an endless cycle, and she pays the karma of her mistakes with pain. Now, she has to tread carefully when meeting new people. She can’t longer dare to seek eternal bonds for fear that the person fastened on the other end will let go.</p><p> </p><p>Death and abandonment she carries with her everywhere she goes. Two concepts so different yet so similar, intertwined to form a stark reality where nothing is forever, and people who don’t deserve it, are taken away for good when you least expect it.</p><p> </p><p>Kara always fails to understand why it has never been her in their place.</p><p> </p><p>The guilt of having been the one who lived is unbearable.</p><p> </p><p>There’s a void inside her, withering Kara from inside out, but the pouring rain soaks her pajamas, cleans the drought and streams down her face to mingle with her tears. She can no longer decode where exactly the pain comes from. Until she does. And the reason she can't guess is the source of pain not being there—being at least half a mile away from Kara, probably locked in the room with her own tears and spite. </p><p> </p><p>Nothing breaks her the way thinking about the day she loses Lena does.</p><p> </p><p>"What are you up to?" Kara yells, arms raised skyward, spitting out the water that seeps into her mouth. There is so much wrath, and she wishes to be louder than the storm that strikes the rustling trees with momentum. "What do you want from me?"</p><p> </p><p>Worst of all, she doesn't even know who she's talking to.</p><p> </p><p>"Buddy, I’m bulldozing through all this stuff you keep throwing at me, and I never complain, but, don’t you think it’s been enough?” Kara snakes her hands over her scalp, tugging at the roots of golden curls, shoulders sagging with each sob. "Are you planning on taking Lena away from me too? Because I'll die fighting if you ever try to tear us apart."</p><p> </p><p>In the gist of her sorrow, Kara picks up a rock from the floor and tilts her body, her arm playing the slingshot part when she launches it without direction, trying to discharge onto something else the pain that dwells in her being. Momentarily forgetting the treacherous might of the End Line and its boomerang effect, physical hurt becomes a companion, blinding her as the stone bounces back and lands on her temple, slashing open the skin of its victim.</p><p> </p><p>Her knees protest after hitting the ground, and Kara wants her own might back, if only to threaten back with the demolition of this entire civilisation. The jagged and uneven soil digs into her bones as the sky opens in two to swallow her whole and imprison her in her personal living hell. </p><p> </p><p>"Can you let me have this, this once? I don’t want to lose her," Kara murmurs, half gone, giving up. Her right hand shooting up to the side of her head, she hisses when warm, thick liquid bathes her face past cheekbones, jaw and droplets of water. </p><p> </p><p>Her vision works hard to gain focus, vignette edges blurring when she staggers and stumbles to her feet, but it's getting real late and Kara is nearing the state of unwarranted oblivion.</p><p> </p><p>She's not sure how, exactly, but she manages to cross the threshold of her home, dragging her breath and muddy footprints all across the foyer to leave a trail behind her. The fuzziness of her mind alters her senses, and Kara just needs to close her eyes… and Lena, she needs Lena. </p><p> </p><p>The harsh light of the hallway makes an effort, but it brings a fresh wave of fresh tears. Lena is sitting near the main door biting her nails and staring into the void, but she scrambles to her feet the second she senses her presence back in the building. Finding Kara’s bloodshot eyes first, before Lena, <em> her perfect, sweet Lena, </em> reads the anguish in her body language and runs to her, bodies collide in a cosmic entanglement that begins to fill the cracked emptiness, to give her something to hold on to. Her anchor in the midst of the intrepid storm.</p><p> </p><p>"Where were you? You had me worried sick." Lena sniffles into her neck, her own tears spilling mercilessly. Kara turns her head so she can't see the wound, but it's a hopeless case because the light blue silk of her pajamas is splattered with scarlet beads, and Lena chokes on a gasp. "Oh, my love, are you alright? How– how did this happen?" </p><p> </p><p>Kara is showered in the shame of her thoughtless whims, but the set of arms holding her up won't let her escape into that place. She keeps quiet as Lena drapes her arm around her shoulders and leads them to their room, maintaining the steady vow of silence as she helps her into the Rondor radiation capsule to stitch the gash—longing for it to close the holes in her heart—and sheds her ruined pajamas to guide her down the marble steps until Kara sinks into the steaming bathtub, muscles sighing and eyes glued to the one-way glass wall that allows a view of the Scarlet Jungle visage surrounding the back of the greenhouse, rain still pattering the sides of moonlit leaves. </p><p> </p><p>Kara doesn't dare chance a look at Lena, who, honest to her behaviour from hours before, can’t take her eyes off her. This time the concern is tenfold and the water ripples beside her as someone else joins her, but Kara doesn't give up.</p><p> </p><p>"You are my tether to humanity." The weak, raspy croak that reverberates across the chamber doesn't sound like hers, but Kara gulps down, steels herself  and continues, “the years I haven't spent stuck in the void, most have been stuck somewhere trying to figure my place in this new world. I'm always feeling like an outsider, like I gotta try harder than anyone else to belong. </p><p> </p><p>"But when I met you, I didn't feel the need to pretend. There was this person who didn't have any expectations, who didn't have to love me out of obligation. You chose me every single day, chose Kara over the <em> mighty Supergirl</em>, and I've been choosing you just the same for years." Reddish rivulets stain the water where Lena scrubs traces of blood from her skin, and Kara sucks in a shaky breath, the earthy smell of oakmoss giving relief. "I was terrified of losing the only person who ever loved <em> just Kara</em>, and I know I was selfish and shouldn't have handled things the way I did, but I did it because the mere thought of losing you was– it was unbearable. I couldn't afford to lose what we had." </p><p> </p><p>The fingers tracing a blazing path over her jaw stop, and Kara finally turns her neck to meet the only shade of green that strengthens her. "You are my home on Earth, Lena. I have my family and I have friends and I love them so much, but my sister and you... you made Earth home for me. You make me feel ordinary, like I don't own this planet the burden of a lifetime for letting me crash here when I was a child. You make me feel like the side of me who wears glasses, stumbles on her feet and writes puff pieces about penguins in her free time is as worthy and important as the side that stops planes from crashing and worlds from dying.</p><p> </p><p>“I can be my truest self when I’m with you, and that's something I never imagined I'd have again. At first, yeah, maybe– maybe I didn't tell you because we had just met, there wasn't a lot of trust built yet, and my brain was already trained not to trust you. But time went by and you proved my family’s doubts wrong every single time.”</p><p> </p><p>“Kara…” </p><p> </p><p>She blinks, blue eyes twinkling under the whitewashed reflection of the chandelier and softly says, “I realised I trusted you, and there was this primal need to protect you from any harm to the point I would've died for you in the blink of an eye. I was terrified that protecting you meant losing you, because trust was compromised."</p><p> </p><p>"You won’t lose me."</p><p> </p><p>"No, Lena, I know I did. You're here, but I've never felt you farther away." </p><p> </p><p>Lena shuffles closer and rests her forehead on Kara's, an attempt to provide physical closeness. Both their eyes close, the tide of her breathing crashing against Kara’s lips. "We're here, that's all we need." </p><p> </p><p>"And if it isn’t enough? You said it." She retorts, frightened by the possibility. Droplets of soapy water stick long strands of hair to her forehead, and Lena brushes them away with her hand and a smile.</p><p> </p><p>"I came to National City to work alongside Supergirl, and it was… something." Though her smile has a bitter curve to it, the sweet melody of her words soothes Kara’s worries. "All my life, I learned to suffer and try to lick my wounds alone in a giant bedroom. Then, you know, <em> you </em> were willing to help me glue my broken pieces back together, but when I– I… broke again, hundreds of pieces more than before, you weren't there and it felt like it no longer had a cure, I swear– never had I ever known that kind of pain. Without you, I felt... hopeless, like there wasn't a reason to heal for if this dumb blonde wasn’t going to be there to see it." </p><p> </p><p>“Hey!”</p><p> </p><p>“Darling, I know I wasn’t entitled to your secret. Hell, god knows I have secrets of my own I can’t tell even if I’m dying too–“ her eyes don’t stray from Kara’s–“but you kind of made it my business when you went all Jekyll and Hyde on me.” </p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I really thought it was the right thing to do, but it was too late when I realised it wasn’t and there was no coming back from it." </p><p> </p><p>"It was, at a time,” she says, dragging her thumb across Kara’s lower lip. “You healed me in many ways, you taught me what love without conditions was, and how to live with hope. I can’t find it myself to regret that." </p><p> </p><p>“I don’t regret meeting you, either.”</p><p> </p><p>It’s mutual forgiveness, even if it’s not spoken aloud. But it feels like an ageless era is closing, giving way to something new, something better. </p><p> </p><p>Kara isn’t afraid of what's to come. She is set free, and ready to heal.</p><p> </p><p>"So what's next? I don't wanna keep fighting, it hurts too much–" Lena's lips on hers silence her, tongue hot and dreamy as they shift to melt together. Kara moves, inching closer to her side for advantage, and reaches out to wrap an arm around her waist, pulling Lena in until their fronts brush.</p><p> </p><p>Lena giggles, wet hands stroking the cheeks she cradles when Kara chases after her mouth, a desperate hand trailing up to pull her by the neck. "I’m not sure, but we’ll make it right."</p><p>
  <br/>
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  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Heather Vine: a malignant vine that becomes a threat when exposed to any type of significant radiation.<br/>Gronya: green mushroom, variety of fungal plant found in the Scarlet Jungle.<br/>Mento-ray: designed to freeze artist's mental pictures on canvas, creating masterpieces by merely envisioning them in their minds.</p><p>i didn't mean to make you wait so long for an update, nor did i mean to make it so angsty. but life has mysterious ways and, in the most unexpected of ways, i lost a family member and it's been kind of crazy since then. for me, this was painful-yet-cathartic release, and i hope you think i did justice for kara and lena, as well as the conversation they deserve to have after everything they've been through.</p><p>have a lovely weekend friends xX</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. destined to the El</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>life works in mysterious ways, but there's always a star in the sky to guide lena home.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>trigger warnings for:</p><p>mention of death, mention of blood, heights and bodies of water.</p><p>whew, it's been long even after i promised it wouldn't. but promising things is way easier than making them true. so, have at it, good friends. i really hope you like this chapter, it's been my favourite to write so far.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p> </p><p>Let it be known, that throughout the strenuous, taxing and yet somewhat tender twenty-seven years she’s inhabited Earth, only three truths have endured buried in the crevices of her courage. And, as much as these are the ones crowned to govern the learned traits that form and operate her psyche, Lena can’t find within herself the ability to remove the padlock to let them make their getaway, let them adapt to the elements of her character that are diaphanous to the rest of the world.</p><p> </p><p>It is as if, she is sure, the moment she eases the death grip on those variables, the heavy lid of her pandora's box will take flight and with it the black-winged demons will come out to execute pandemonium, overturning her already upturned life to torture her for the rest of eternity, casting a spell to lock her up in the afterlife punishing prison she read about in the sacred texts her governess forced her to study. </p><p> </p><p>Chaos. Apocalypse. There will be no other outcome. </p><p> </p><p>Regardless, she wears these three old-fashioned truths as a mantra on her sleeve: jotting them down on the crumpled sheets full of sleepy, soaked in drool scribbles that could as well be the cure for cancer if well deciphered. Whispering them into the rim of her glass as she dances in and out an alcohol-induced haze on the nights shame is too much to be handled sober. Playing them on a loop in front of the harsh LED light of the mirror mounted on the wall of her walk-in, a manifestation of things to come and prevail.</p><p> </p><p>Private to everyone else, but the daily word Lena consumes with the intention of keeping her sanity in her pockets and remaining true to herself. </p><p> </p><p>1. Being misjudged—being told she <em> can't, </em> is what drives her to strip and show the steel structure under her fragile skin. </p><p> </p><p>2. It doesn’t matter how many languages she masters, love is the single tongue whose conditionals she hasn’t fully grasped, and years of tunnel-vision observation seem to confirm that all parts of speech translate into <em> betrayal. </em> </p><p> </p><p>3. Dodge as many bullets as she may, Lena Luthor has been compromised either way, and she has fallen truly, madly, deeply in love with Kara Danvers.</p><p> </p><p>Number one arises from the evidence her eidetic memory provides—the same one she sometimes wishes she could scrub off her parietal lobe with a steel wool—and it was a sixteen-year-old Lex screaming in her face that <em> it had taken nearly two millennia for a woman to find a Mersenne prime, you foolish girl won’t be the second to do so, </em> the orchestrator of an unstoppable quest. </p><p> </p><p>That night was the first time she raised her voice in the Luthor mansion, buckled under the magnifying glass and through shaky words and faith shattering in tandem with a fallen hero, she swore to herself that another two thousand years could pass, she would invent the cure for mortality, back when she thought meeting her maker was a disease, but the fifty-second term on the Mersenne list was hers.</p><p> </p><p>So far, she has danced with death and overcome mortality, and is currently in pursuit of that petty prime.</p><p> </p><p>The second is so straight to the point that it doesn't even require explanation, but Lena swallows the metaphor clogging her throat and counts to three to calm her racing heart. </p><p> </p><p>She has been let down far too often, led and trampled on by the counted-on-fingers list of people she associates with true love. </p><p> </p><p>Betrayed by the Luthor Triple Entente who offered her a mid-time slot in the circus when all she asked for was a home. Betrayed by the first person she let read the lines of her heritage’s tale in the rocky planes of a Costa Rican jungle. Betrayed by the mentor she welcomed as a mother figure until she learned the outdated tiara wasn’t a halo but rather horns ushering genocidal intentions and, once again, one of her inventions was weaponized to threaten her own race. </p><p> </p><p>Betrayed by her best friend, to whom she gave herself body and soul, and got a broken heart as reward. </p><p> </p><p>Which leads to Kara Danvers, the hostess for her third and final truth, and… it's a question of inevitability, to fall in love with her, <em> isn't it? </em>Lena thinks as she wanders the halls of what she now knows Kryptonian culture often referred to as the noble House of El, the staccato of her boots reverberating under the rings leading to the lab stairs. It is inevitable for a mass of atoms to orbit the sun and not be blinded by its glow. </p><p> </p><p>The fear she once felt for this ultimate truth is overridden by the love that consumes her from inside out and thaws the ice in her veins, by the fervent desire to allow her soul to entangle with Kara's as long as time allows, and let her light illuminate every bruised corner of the darkness that grips her life. </p><p> </p><p>Lena loved her. Loves her. Will always love her.</p><p> </p><p>She loves the young woman dressed up in pastel cardigans obscenely tight on her shoulders and askew glasses too small for her face who rushed in after her brother's public enemy to crack the code and find the way to Lena’s eager heart within her first days in the city. The same one who interrupted hot dates with spreadsheets to threaten with a good time, pierced with her warmth and let her know that it was okay to open up to new people in a new landscape, to trust the safety net of friendship to stop her fall—even when Kara didn't warn her that she would be the reason there would be falling in the first place. </p><p> </p><p>She's in love with Kara Danvers, who writes wonders about her, gifts flowers to fill the void left by the abrupt death of a loved one and is willing to fight an affair of honour with an in-law just to defend her. In too deep for the woman who skips skilled secretaries to demand information about fight clubs, but flushes from head to toe at Lena’s confessions of her being the reason a certain appetizer made it onto the list at such highfalutin gala. The one who asks her to <em> be her own hero </em> , whispers in her ear that <em> she isn’t going anywhere, </em>  and vouches for her other self to let Lena know she <em> believes </em>in her even when nature in decay is about to collapse onto them.</p><p> </p><p>Lena would give anything for her, for the honest blue eyes, too-big smiles and the lousy jokes. Give up her pride to see Kara excitedly shift from side to side in her stool when she has a good run on bingo nights at Noonan's, to see her pet strangers' dogs when they go for a run, feel her become a blissed out puddle whenever her hands rake through her scalp. But only for her, because she’s always sitting on the other end of memorable lunches and always reminds Lena to buy groceries when she's two days into having forgotten. For the leather journals with blue ribbons on the first day of work because <em> it’s a Danver’s family tradition </em> , for the wine-stained broken glasses in the trash and her own messes fixed simply because <em> there's still a chance it wasn’t you. </em> For the small details that still take her by surprise because there’s someone who <em> listens. </em></p><p> </p><p>Maybe her eidetic memory is not the enemy she swore it was.</p><p> </p><p>Kara... even if she was the reason for Lena’s many sleepless nights, sobbing the betrayal and heartbreak out of her system until she was knocked-out in a borrowed sweater, soaking the vanilla smell of the garment with the alkaline tears that spilled over the cloth clutched to her chest in a desperate attempt to stop feeling so much and so raw. That last one <em> even </em>is paramount because...</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> For you, that's why I'm doing this. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> You are a brilliant, kind-hearted, beautiful soul. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I was selfish and scared, and I didn't want to lose you.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> For a friend like you there are no boundaries. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>For Lena, it will always be Kara.</p><p> </p><p>The constricting hugs strung around her waist, and double taps on her back when the peak of her happiness has no remedy. The secrets scented of trampled grapes uttered face to face on midnights of mutual equanimity, the soothing thumb that draws sluggish patterns on the inside of her wrist or ankle as they huddle together on Kara’s knobbly sofa, and the thousand antics she's pulled just to get a smile from Lena. </p><p> </p><p>Because Kara Danvers staggered into her life to make a home right in the cavity of her sternum, and taught her she is as worthy of granting forgiveness as she is of being forgiven, as long as they keep coming back to each other.</p><p> </p><p>She fell deeply in love, has known for some time. And despite the doctrine embedded in her brain, coming down to that truth wasn’t a forecasted overwhelming epiphany. Because for Lena, Kara is closing her eyes and taking a breath for the first time after being thrown into the unforgiving clutches of this cold world at a very young age.</p><p> </p><p><em> "Shisir!" </em>Lena hears the broadcaster before she sees her, knows a grimace is girded in the space between her eyebrows due the gruff intonation of the spat-out Kryptonian. The last few steps of the spiral stairs are feeble, cold seeps into her bones as she leans against the wall for support.</p><p> </p><p>"You know, it's taken you a month to show me you can swear like a sailor given the right tools." It's this third truth, the only one she's no longer afraid to keep in the down low, not when Kara looks up with a smile swelling in her face and glistening in her unshielded eyes. The easy access to her gaze the main reason her heart skips a semibreve of beats.</p><p> </p><p>"Hey, sleepyhead, got tangled in bedsheets?" Kara turns to face her, but Lena is quick in execution and ties her arms around her neck from behind, burying her nose into the pleasant scent that covers her shoulder before leaving a kiss there, still arched into her back. </p><p> </p><p>"Shut up," she mutters against the suede, rolling her eyes when she knows she won’t get caught and thus judged by the bratty command. "I had a long night." </p><p> </p><p>Because that's something that's been happening more often, it's something they're <em> doing </em> more often.</p><p> </p><p>By sharp reckoning, thirty-three days have passed since her physical life became a metaphysical concept. Thirty-three days where Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso fit into one part. A long month of laughter, tears, arguments of forgiveness and discoveries of Argo’s and Krypton's culture stretched out at arm's length for her to grasp and examine. They've been on this dimensional vacay—a name she truly despises but keeps safe on the tip of her tongue to see the joyous twitch of pink lips—for a long time. Days on end drifting in and out of a transcendental dream starring a frightened girl trying to figure out how it is she returned to the foundation of the place that birthed her and watched her grow up, even as she tries to hide it so as not to worry Lena.</p><p> </p><p>Despite the circumstances, Lena has never carried more honor in being the person Kara chose to share the scorching pain of the reality that was taken from her, that left a permanent void that later rather than <em> sooner </em> was filled with sunshine instead. She is devoted to being the guest star who kisses the tears off Kara’s face when memories take too much space and its roots trigger a pain buried in the epicenter of a world long gone.</p><p> </p><p>Needless to say… she's also grateful for the updates of their relationship status, the same one she considered to be platonic and hopelessly unrequited right until the second she lounged after hearing Kara talk about <em> fate </em> and <em> us </em> and not being able to live <em> without you, </em> and was greeted with arms wide open into what she hopes is her last first kiss, her last first time. But the inherent homoeroticism of their physical activities doesn't carry the same emotional weight of whatever enclosed eden Lex conjured up, and Lena hasn't had the heart to stamp the question mark of what exactly is going on between them as they stagger on a meridian of will and won’t above everything else for the vehement respect and commendation she has silently sworn to her best friend.</p><p> </p><p>However, being in love and willing to wait for a label doesn't mean Lena can't entertain herself in the meantime. Not when there's even the slightest chance of these feelings being reciprocated. Not when it's Kara herself dangling the bait for Lena to bite. </p><p> </p><p>"That so, uh? And what, exactly, kept you up at night?" the cocked smirk is as hypocritical as her feigned innocence, and Lena presses her thumb on Kara's pulse to get her off cloud nine. </p><p> </p><p>"Something about your face stuffed between my le–“</p><p> </p><p>"–okay, gotcha," she snorts, although her ears tinge bright red. A set of solid arms weave behind her back, and Kara squeezes once more against her before bending her neck to the side, a lone golden curl falling onto her face. "C’mere, I want to see your face." A sigh catches in Lena’s throat, spells pathetic with the rush.</p><p> </p><p>Docile and giddy with joy, she obeys, stepping aside to allow Kara to settle in and let her snake an arm around Lena’s waist, her greedy hand finding a spot where her blouse isn't tucked inside her pants to hook her thumb in the hollow dimple in the small of her lower back. She leans back against Kara's side, who in turn rests her hip on the golden worktable and picks up one of the silver spheres haphazardly strewn around, tossing it into the air to catch it in her hands again. </p><p> </p><p>"This thing is kicking my ass." The angle of her jaw flexes where she grinds her teeth and Lena withdraws her hand, begrudgingly, where it pressed into the dips and ridges of Kara's abdomen.</p><p> </p><p>"Let me."</p><p> </p><p>The sphere turns out to be one of the projectors Lena has been fussing over on her last few visits to the lab, and she looks over a broad shoulder to make sure her project is still hidden from prying eyes. </p><p> </p><p>"Look, I have a theory– maybe I'm an idiot and completely wrong, but have you noticed that every single time we need something, the next day it’s here as if by… I don’t know, magic?" Kara asks in a squeaky voice, suddenly thrilled, and Lena nods because she can see where her hypothesis is headed, if the maps projected in different corners of the room make up a clue. "Maybe if we think hard enough, we'll find other things here. And I'm dying to show you the Rainbow Canyons, so I'm trying to..."</p><p> </p><p>Kara talks and keeps talking and the flow of her words is perceived underwater in the rumble of blood gurgling in her ears. Her eyes are hypnotic blue with the gray wisps of lightning bolts under the septic light of the lab, her nose is perfect with the bump on the cusp of its bridge and her lips are plump and so glossy, Lena can almost see herself reflected in the sheen at the corner when Kara sticks her tongue out to lick them. </p><p> </p><p>Not one to employ biblical metaphors often, Lena dares to think she portrays a modern angel without the wings. It is too much to take.</p><p> </p><p>Rising to her tallest tiptoes, she uses her free hand to trap Kara's rosy cheeks between thumb and the remaining four digits, squeezing until bewildered lips pucker and her eyes close with the surprise element of Lena giving her a smacking kiss.</p><p> </p><p>"–for us to… for us to go there and– hi, hello. What’s that for?" Kara laughs, low and happy, the sound slowed by the glazed over layer stitched across the seams of her face.</p><p> </p><p>Lena loves that she can kiss her now instead of biting her tongue every time desire throbs through her body.</p><p> </p><p>"I like girls who ramble." </p><p> </p><p>"Know a lot of ‘em?" </p><p> </p><p>"Only one has caught my eye." </p><p> </p><p>Kara rolls her eyes. "Focus and give me a hand. I really want to share this with you." She lowers her gaze, whispering words against her temple with such gentleness and such freedom, like she is none the wiser to the daggers that turn and heal at the same time.</p><p> </p><p>"What if we rub sunstone crystals while you chant I wish, I wish, with all my heart, to fly with dragons in a land apart?" Throwing in a quip to eradicate the pout right in front of her line of sight, Lena jests and takes two hits for the price of one.</p><p> </p><p>"What?" The tilt of Kara’s head is adorable, her nose wrinkling and her eyes liquefying like a toxic acid spilling and dragging Lena into an affluent that steers her until she lands in a river of vast adoration. </p><p> </p><p>"Nothing, my love.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara huffs, strands of hair fluttering around her and Lena laughs as her hand trips to card through honey roots, removing a particularly unruly lock from her forehead. The pout she was trying to get rid of returns in form, and it's a matter of seconds before the shotgun unleashes war in her chest. </p><p> </p><p>Can someone die from an overdose of love after so long in abstinence? </p><p> </p><p>Love.</p><p> </p><p>Love.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Love. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Goddamn, Lena Luthor really has fallen in love.</p><p> </p><p>Hell will freeze over when she accepts it out loud, but maybe her mother was right all those dinner parties where she vowed ad nauseam that no human being with rational capacity could ever love her. Maybe Lillian suspected she was destined for something that transcended the limits of humanity, and hadn't Vitruvius been precise about the—Lena considers it petty—exclusiveness of <em> human </em>proportions, she is sure she would have been the one inspired to carve her own concept of perfection with her bloody hands, if only to prove this girl of the stars is the wonder that bounces beyond limits, and she’s the one Lena’s destined to. </p><p> </p><p>Ascribed to be loved, and to love through the nanoparticles of cosmic dust that coats the thread that binds them together even when light years set them apart. To be loved, and to love.</p><p> </p><p>She now believes it, for though romantic affection is far from being the field of her expertise, to say that they love each other is the truest statement she has ever concluded in her life, and the proof is in the way she can feel Kara with the lights out. </p><p> </p><p>The temptation to mention how warm Kara is latched behind her is held in her mind, the pressure of a chin resting on the top of her head nailing Lena to the moment. "What do we have here?" </p><p> </p><p>"I already put the crystal in, but I tried dozens of combinations and nothing works," Kara complains, lightly kicking the leg of the workbench. </p><p> </p><p>Lena takes a closer look, clicking her tongue as she examines the patterns on the sphere and tucks closer into Kara’s chest. "There’s this Rubik method called ZZ..."</p><p> </p><p>"The few things I know about solving a Rubik's cube are thanks to you. I haven't touched that subject in a long time." The veins in her forearms stand out as she circles Lena’s waits. </p><p> </p><p>"If you'd taken two minutes to research, you'd have turned this thing on by now." Said and done, Lena spins the sphere in a design of algorithmic directions, and in the next beat a new projection rises in the lab, one more shade of blue hovering in the area.</p><p> </p><p>A loud squeal and a sloppy kiss on her cheek are what she gets as thanks, and Kara moves to mold herself to fit the dips of her back better, properly keeping her hostage as two large hands latch on either side of her on the table. "I actually looked it up, but I wanted you to be the one to teach me," she mumbles next to her ear, now resting her strong jaw on the relaxed curve between Lena's neck and shoulder.</p><p> </p><p>Both their gazes fix on the disclosed information. While she is a curious onlooker, observing rather than understanding the lines and dots that form a language that isn’t so alien to her, Kara is an avid reader, and it takes the exact time measure of a heart breaking for every single inch of fibrous tissue in her body to go taut, a puff of air coming to her in a rising stream of worry.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> "No." </em>
</p><p> </p><p>That's a blade aimed at the jugular.</p><p> </p><p>"What's wrong?" She grabs Kara's clenched fist, smoothing her fingers to let go of the table, hissing as they curl over her wrist instead but immediately let go. "Darling, what's wrong?"</p><p> </p><p>"Wait– give me… give me a minute." Her breathing is ragged, the harbinger of an inner turmoil that Lena is beginning to familiarize herself with. So she waits, rubbing halfhearted hearts in her open hands as red-rimmed eyes glide over the projection.</p><p> </p><p>Whatever it is, Lena doesn't trust it to be anything good.</p><p> </p><p>"They're– uh, father's journals, dated to three years before I was born," Kara mutters after a few agonizing minutes in silence, "it's a chronicle about the development of Krypton and... there are entries about the decay of the planet, the bad state it was in even–"</p><p> </p><p>"Kara..."</p><p> </p><p>"Recent samples evidence Krypton’s uranium core increasing in internal pressure, growing more and more unstable,” she translates for her, “after a cycle of chain-impulses, a geological survey confirms our suspicions. The destabilization of the planetary core and the energy loss suggests radioactivity in the breathable air, with no chance of improvement even subjected to long periods of observation under support by the purifying machines developed by the Guild." Kara pulls at the roots of her hair, sliding her hand across her squared jaw until it comes to cradle her neck. </p><p> </p><p>Waves of anguished love permeate Lena one after the other, a hammer threatens to shatter her ribcage at the sight of Kara being the scion of family disappointment. She's been there before, after all. But it isn’t easy to meet her eyes and find three different concepts of dismay in there.</p><p> </p><p>"He knew, Lena, he knew Krypton was on the verge of dying and yet he– they had the nerve to use the matrix to make me. Why would they have me if my life was going to be taken away from me right before I started living it?"</p><p> </p><p>"Maybe your parents–"</p><p> </p><p>"–father had lots of chances to warn our people, but he allowed everyone to die. He–“ her nostrils flare–“he was a selfish bastard who endangered our lives, and only made mine a living hell by not letting me go with them."</p><p> </p><p>Well, the implications of that thought they will perforce have to revisit.</p><p> </p><p>"Didn't he think of the guilt?" Kara mutters, and the only reason she hears her is proximity. Quiet tears stream down her face, and as much as Lena believed she was starting to master the affliction of seeing Kara hurt like this, empathetic pain courses through her limbs with a lack of preamble. <em>"</em><em>R</em> <em> ao, </em> I was a kid." </p><p> </p><p>No set of well-assembled words can grant strength when one is in a freefall towards parental disillusionment, so she holds Kara close, fingers tapping the notches of her spine, nodding when she muses <em> stay </em>and hides in the crook of her neck. </p><p> </p><p>"Part of me already knew that." Kara lets out a shaky breath, kneading her eyelids with the heel of her hand. "I mean, I knew they made some weird decisions but to see it like this..."</p><p> </p><p>"You have the right to be disappointed."</p><p> </p><p>"I'm not," she fumes, teeth chattering, "I'm <em> fucking </em> furious."</p><p> </p><p>Kara whips the sphere out the space where it was suspended, fiercely unlatching the compartment to remove the crystal of knowledge as if it were a drive. The projection extinguishes with a soft exhale from the machine and her palm tightens around the piece. </p><p> </p><p>"They were always this way, I was just too dumb and naive to know it," she finally continues, breathing hard and laughing, "they used their power to oppress and... holy light of Rao, mom created a prison for the people who didn't agree with her ideology!" </p><p> </p><p>The tension in her face is a dead giveaway, not being able to control the glimpses of ruthless emotions that Lena has only seen peek to the surface a couple of times since meeting her. She is partially grateful for the clear way she has to Kara's eyes, that a lead barrier and two translucent glasses don't hinder her ability to discern what Kara’s feeling.</p><p> </p><p>"Once…” Kara gulps, scratching a pale eyebrow with her thumbnail. Blood rushes away from her lips when she worries them between her teeth and chews the corner of her mouth. “There were times when it felt like aunt Astra was the only one who really cared, that cared more about me than maintaining whatever rank of sovereignty my parents put first." Her eyes avert from the hologram. "I was twelve when she left, but I didn't know she was running away. Somehow, mom convinced me to convince her to visit, and I used a beacon to locate her. But when she got here… I was in my twenties when I realised mother had used me as bait to send her to Fort Rozz." </p><p> </p><p>Ah, the masterful use of a maternal bond to deceive a gullible daughter. It was on her seventh birthday when Lena heard of it for the first time. </p><p> </p><p>Still, doesn’t mean it isn’t fucked up.</p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry your parents did this, you don't deserve to carry the ghost of their mistakes," Lena offers anyway, because she does know the support of a loved one can be the fuel that pulls the tires out of the mud in order to keep rolling. She strokes her cheek, once, twice, bearing the weight of her face as Kara leans into the touch. "Coming from a world of pain and yet you choose to be a beacon of hope and light for everyone around? That’s what makes you <em> you </em>." </p><p> </p><p>"What if I feel like shutting off?"</p><p> </p><p>"Then you do." Propping her hand on Kara's chest, her radial pulse rocking in tune with her heartbeat, Lena intercedes, boring her eyes into her with intent. "You don't have to sacrifice yourself to be the hero. Your heart is the purest form of selflessness I know, but it's more than okay if you need to take a break to mend it."</p><p> </p><p>Fingers find her wrist, twining around it like ivy, and Lena sucks in a breath. Hands slotted together, Kara thus manages to guide Lena’s to her lips, kissing and applying the same amount of reverence and adoration to each protruding knuckle. </p><p> </p><p>"Thank you." She hums against the tip of Lena's forefinger trailing over her lip.</p><p> </p><p>Her retort is obnoxious, playfully smug. "That's what friends are for."</p><p> </p><p>Lena pats herself on the back when the amused smile Kara shoots her way only auspices the spike of a slight arrhythmia in her chest.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Kara Danvers, for all her vitamin D-induced energy, has never been one to rise with the sun. It’s only gotten worse to the tenth power by the intergalactic jetlag she’s victim to at least three days in what Lena has discovered makes up a <em> fanff </em>. She should have known better when she put the idea of leaving as the clock struck south, at the first glimpse of Rao in their window. </p><p> </p><p>It's been four days since their conversation in the lab, lazy mornings spent with legs tangled under sheets, drowsy whispers of the <em> cannons not gonna leave soon </em> against the skin of her bare blades, and Kara covering her face with a pillow to avoid Lena's accusing glare whenever she’s made them late and the right time to leave is long gone. But she can't bestow all blame upon her, because as much as she considers herself a pro at beating the sun in the race to rise—forced nurture more than nature—this skill has been on the wane to abate for the past half-decade, ever since she found a deserving sleepover associate who exudes the warmth of a million radiators, extends the security of a weighted blanket and provides the snores of a white noise machine.</p><p> </p><p>Kara has ruined her self-imposed habits in more ways than one.</p><p> </p><p>So, yes, Lena should have known better. She's not exempt to whiny requests to linger in bed, or curly eyelashes fluttering and manipulating her until she's just growling and chastising Kara, telling her that tomorrow will indeed be the day they go on their sightseeing trek. </p><p> </p><p>And, as delighted and anxious as a child before leaving for a school trip as she is, the night before she spent hours packing and unpacking their bags in a fit of domesticity after noticing that the things Kara considers essential for survival are Twellian sodas, a bottle of Gronya sauce, two and a half pairs of dirty socks and a gown, dried Silten leaves—Lena actually lets that one slide because she's sure Kara stuffed the seaweed in just for her—a journal with <em> tiv girod </em> inscribed on the cover and a godforsaken flashlight that won't even turn on. </p><p> </p><p>Instead, with sustainable food and drinks, proper clothing, communication beacons, an encapsulated Rondor horn in case of emergencies and the crystals of knowledge along with probably any item that does belong in a survival kit packed and secure, she is fully geared up and set to go.</p><p> </p><p>The snoring beast lying with her legs sprawled and reaching both corners of the bed, on the other hand, doesn't fare close to Lena’s militia-like responsibility. </p><p> </p><p>Resting her fists on her hips, she summons all her dogged determination and trudges over to her bedmate, careful not to step on the mattress with her boots as she crawls to the beauty plunged into a deep sleep. </p><p> </p><p>"Kara." She calls slowly, gently, brushing the side of her hip where her nightshirt rode up. "Kara, love, wake up. It's time to go." </p><p> </p><p>Eyelids flutter, and for a second Lena comes to think she'll make it on the first try, but Kara plunges into the warpath and chooses to be a little imp, grunts in her sleep, turning her face away and depriving her from catching a glimpse of her peaceful slumber. Lena snorts and rolls her eyes, hopes diminished but nearly intact. </p><p> </p><p>Shifting closer, the tips of her hair creating a curtain around them, feather-light kisses are sown on Kara's forehead, the mar beside her eyebrow, closed lids and soft cheeks, but she’s unfazed, not bothering to pretend in the face of modesty. Even the squeeze on her ribs or the brush of chapped lips across the tip of her nose fail to prompt a signal of acquiescence.</p><p> </p><p>"Come on, I know you're awake." A digit pokes Kara’s cheek, outlines burrowed brows before Lena combs her loose hair away from her face.</p><p> </p><p>"Who thought of this?" Kara manages to mourn, hoarse and stretching syllables as she struggles with the threat of giving back into interrupted sleep. "Let's do this tomo–"</p><p> </p><p>"Nuh-uh, missy. You came up with this idea, and now you’re my only obstacle." Her knee digs into Kara's side, tracing the curve of her ear and tugging on her earlobe when her eyes slide close again. Maybe she's being pushy, but this is Krypton, Kara's home planet. The ambition to find the roads and places that once helped shape who this <em> girl of the stars </em> is prickles like needles under her skin.</p><p> </p><p>Using the support of her taut forearm to close the two-inch gap, Lena fastens her lips to the bone that precipitates the drop of Kara’s jaw, all while she drags the blunt edge of her nails across perfectly sculpted obliques, scratching a wake of goosebumps until she meets the waistband of her underwear. </p><p> </p><p>A single eye cracks open. "Awake! ‘m awake." Kara stretches and yawns, the blueprint of a lion cub with the round canines and golden mane haloed around her. </p><p> </p><p>Lena drops one last kiss to the blood-rush beat of her pulse. "Took you long enough." </p><p> </p><p>"If you'd used this tactic earlier..." They both glance down, Kara craning her neck to spy Lena's hand resting on top of her pelvis, eerily still. </p><p> </p><p>"Wakey, wakey, sunshine temptress," she taunts, pecking the corner of her mouth before straightening, only to be yanked back down by invisible strings to flop on the mattress like a puppet. "You really need to stop manhandling me." </p><p> </p><p>"Thought you liked it rough." Lena’s neck tingles right where lips curl onto the sensitive patch of skin and she gulps back down the whimper that bubbles up her throat before it emerges and embarrases her.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Little imp.  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Kara settles in the spot between her parted legs, letting her weight plummet onto Lena's torso, chin reclined on her chest. Skin soft to the touch, warm and illuminated by Rao's light, she cups her cheeks and brings Kara close, capturing her lips in a lazy, wet kiss that leaves her gasping for more the second the chain snaps. </p><p> </p><p>"Morning, babe." </p><p> </p><p>Lena squirms, dying to break free of the grip this overconfident girl has on her heart. But she's weak and deep in love, it’s obvious she makes more room to be devoured and replies, "good morning, my love." </p><p> </p><p>Their eyes meet, lethargic steel blue and besotted jade, Lena marveling at the shade that brands deep into the ridges of her wrangled soul. It takes a small eternity of infinite seconds for a spark to flicker and rush through her marrow and into her axis, exploding in an indomitable smile that is reciprocated at the same time by one from Kara, mixed with melodic giggles.</p><p> </p><p><em> I love you with everything I am, </em> Lena thinks, waiting for the interlude between the crashing tide and the quiet of a bay at night, the microscopic span of time she is no longer terrified an angry ripple will swallow her whole if she utters the words aloud.</p><p> </p><p>Kara nuzzles her cheek with the tip of her nose, arms cradling her from underneath. She breaks through a long exhale after Lena fans out her palm over the muscles of her back, tracing meaningless scribbles as they linger in the tranquil atmosphere.</p><p> </p><p>"Go shower." It’s her who wrestles the spell, the rise and fall of Kara's breathing in her chest wandering in too slow once more.</p><p> </p><p>A low purr, playful fingers tugging at the collar of her shirt until the first button pops open and warm lips sneak in to worship the starry skin of her collarbones and shoulder. "Join me?"</p><p> </p><p>Then she curses the mirage connecting them because, in perfect synchronicity, Kara rises up to her knees and Lena jerks downward. The bewildered splutter mixes with a huff sparked by longing at the unexpected contact, and the result winds up with a whimper.</p><p> </p><p>Where does this suggestive girl bordering on corrupt come from? When she's the one that matches the red of a fire hydrant the second Lena asks to chaperone her when lingerie shopping is due, or bashfully fixes her glasses and tucks her chin down at the mere mention of the slightest activity requiring physical intimacy, but now thumbs the region under Lena’s breasts without her usual modesty and reservation, thrusts her hip bones to spread her open and repeats devastating words like <em> good girl </em> and cursed <em> join me? </em> as if it doesn't wedge Lena’s matrix with vast chains of short-circuit.  </p><p> </p><p>But outlandish things are happening and… who would’ve believed it? A Super and a Luthor got to fucking in the same bed Kara’s mother used to read her bedtime stories. </p><p> </p><p>Lena regains sensation in her arms and shoves Kara away from her to stop the shower of peppered kisses she fills her with, sending her in the direction of the bathroom and swatting her rear as she hauls to her feet and flings a wink over her shoulder. </p><p> </p><p>"Think of me while I'm gone."  </p><p> </p><p>"Hurry up," Lena orders, propped on a bent elbow. </p><p> </p><p>When she finally hears the stream of water, below it Kara's voice intoning the sweetest rendition of Edith's <em> La Vie En Rose, </em> a favourite of theirs, Lena melts into the mattress and heaves a delighted sigh, hiding the muscle-pulling smile inside a pillow.</p><p> </p><p><em> Elle est entrée dans mon coeur, </em> indeed.</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p>Their humble abode isn’t deserted until two hours later, Lena’s spine too weak to carry the guilty conscience of leaving before Kara could fuel her stomach. </p><p> </p><p>Thirty minutes into long strides and stretched hamstrings, past the jungle and the falls, Kara decides it’s time to cash out the first pit stop, letting go of Lena's hand to shove hers into the bag and zip it close after retrieving one of the spheres programmed to guide their trajectory. Her long fingers grip the silver device, turning and twisting until a print of blue parallels materializes in a holographic intermission, faintly faded under the sunlight. </p><p> </p><p>"Okay, so," Kara leads, knees creaking as she bends to pick up a broken twig. She pushes down her shoulders to make her sit and walks away, a pout blossoms in Lena’s face when Kara pivots on her heels to face her again. The soil underneath them is uneven, but the smooth tip of their shoes fix the inconvenience. "Get ready for a lesson in Kryptonian geography."</p><p> </p><p>Employing the branch to dig crooked lines around the sand, Kara turns on her axis to draw two asymmetrical circles—one with a quivering indentation on the side—and settles on the gap in between. "O Krypton, land of the damned, was divided into two hemispheres. Old World and New World. Both had the Arctic and Antarctic continents, nothing new," she teaches, producing a shaky wave along south and north of the drawing located to Lena's left. "But the Old World had Gorv Ocean to the west, Morstil to the south, and the Dandahu to the east. And this–" the tip of her tongue peeks out her lips, her wrist dancing swiftly to conjure a mass similar to Greenland, but wider–"is Urrika, a continent discovered on one of Val-El's voyages, where Kryptonian civilization began. Right in Erkol, our oldest city."</p><p> </p><p>"Val-El as in..." </p><p> </p><p>An endearing, shy blush blooms on her face. "Yup, as in <em> my </em>El.”</p><p> </p><p>"So your family really was a big deal around here.” She piles her elbows on her knees, leaning forward with the selfish yearn of orbiting close to Kara. “You're telling me you're a descendant of Columbus’ kryptonian wannabe?" Lena asks with a smug smile, biting the flesh of her cheeks to keep from bursting out in laughter.</p><p> </p><p>"Yes, they were my ancestor. No, not a colonizer and, c’mon, by the time Columbus found land steering around his silly boats, we already had flying cabs. Careful who you call wannabe, <em> little human. </em> ” The rolling diction of her faux Eastern European accent is <em> too </em>on point to be anything but fake, and Kara chokes on her laugh, eyes bulging and taken by surprise. “There– mmm, there was a war, started by the Erkol state militia, but that was it."</p><p> </p><p>"One war was just it?" </p><p> </p><p>Sarcasm bolts over her head. "Well I think so, I don't know. Lena, that was ages ago, it’s a miracle I still remember. Do you even know? What did your precious Columbus do?"</p><p> </p><p>She raises an eyebrow, perplexed, because what the hell is that question. "Of course I do, it's history! History is important!"</p><p> </p><p>"Sorry to burst your bubble but I was a cool kid in school," Kara gloats, training the wooden blade in her direction. "Hey, saw that," she scolds, having caught the trail of Lena’s eyeroll.</p><p> </p><p>"I wasn't trying to hide it."</p><p> </p><p>"Uh-kay." A whipcracking sound plays around as Kara slaps the branch against her palm. Lena tosses her head left and right in resignation, watching her hiss and curse under her breath, dulling the sting against the fabric of her trousers. "Ouchie– now, Urrika was surrounded by two seas, Cogo and Banzt, and lots of islands like Nioz, Tuvu… Twenx was also a small continent and, there was another one but the name brings back second grade war flashbacks, so..." </p><p> </p><p>Lena pouts, her grey matter throbs in retaliation. She hates getting new information if it isn't complete, but boundaries are set, and she promised herself never to cross the barrier of what Kara would like to reveal on such a precious subject. </p><p> </p><p>"Can I have some water?" She, once again, is victim of the inquisition of an inert slab of dead tree. Two steps are enough for Kara to meet her halfway, fingers lingering in the moment where they touch across the bottle</p><p> </p><p>Kara bends her elbow, jutting her chin out to reach the water stream, holding her weight on the branch as if it were a walking cane. Mesmerised and fixated in the column of her neck as it bobs with each gulp, Lena thinks that perhaps if she were sporting her glasses, donning the dapper button-downs, Kara would meet the expectations of the lead role object to Lena’s long forgotten and deeply buried college fantasies. </p><p> </p><p>Leaving the bottle in her hand and a wet kiss on her lips, Kara returns to her place, and Lena presses the condensation from the bottle to her cheek to douse the blazing heat in her cheeks. “Thanks.”</p><p> </p><p>"The stage is all yours,” she concedes, eyes shimmering and heart warming as she listens.</p><p> </p><p>"Lurvan, New World, is the large– was the largest continent, right where we’re standing.” Kara outlines the likeness of a misshapen Russia. “There were six islands, Bokos the Island of Thieves, Zith, Yord, Uvlot, Dunol and Mul.</p><p> </p><p>"The three main cities of this hemisphere were here. Argo City, which you already know. Kandor, the former capital of Krypton. And the second Kryptonopolis– the first one was destroyed in the war I mentioned earlier, which was the current capital before the explosion. That's where Kal was born."</p><p> </p><p>"Why wasn’t Kandor the capital anymore?" Lena asks, reaching out to take Kara's hand in both of hers to hold back the obscure layer staining the light in her eyes.</p><p> </p><p>"Ironically, it was stolen and shrunk to microscopic size." She laughs, taking a seat beside her. "Seven million people lived there, and they were shrunk into a bottle, too."</p><p> </p><p>"Well, mind control wasn’t that bad compared to that.”</p><p> </p><p>Kara grimaces, her teeth grinding as she sucks in a breath. "No shade to… uh– Brainy, but Coluans are quite a nasty race."</p><p> </p><p>"A Coluan did that?"</p><p> </p><p>"Yup, Vril Dox, or Brainiac. Brainy is actually his great grandson, but y’know, they're nothing alike."</p><p> </p><p>Lena shouldn't be jealous that other species have had intergalactic parties without her. She shouldn't have envy for being left on the outside when she wore <em> I want to believe </em>hoodies and watched documentaries for so long under the guise of being an adept candidate to be sought to bond with another life form outside Earth. But she is, and she looks down with a furrowed brow.</p><p> </p><p>Sweet, ever so beatific Kara, processes it as something else, quick to interlock their fingers and assure her. "Brainy joined the legion to amend Vril’s mistakes. Reasons like this– this is why I advocate for the benefit of the doubt! This girl once said that we don't have to bear with our families’ wrongdoings, and I think the same thing. I–… I think we deserve to be judged on our own merits, not crucified because an old rag wanted to mess up a whole city."</p><p> </p><p>There is no doubt about the genuineness of her words, because Kara is one to do as she says, and if she didn't practice her own beliefs, she would have thrown in the towel with Lena in the midst of premeditated judgment, leaving her to fend for herself in the outdoors of a mistaken prejudice that few people had ignored. And if Kara had never trusted her hopes upon Lena… well, she wouldn’t know life as it is nowadays. </p><p> </p><p>"She sounds smart." </p><p> </p><p>"The smartest, she's a world-saving genius, haven’t you heard? Keep up with the news, Luthor." Kara wiggles her eyebrows, the little flirt, successfully stealing a snort from her.</p><p> </p><p>“You’re ridiculous–“ </p><p> </p><p>“–but I’m cute–“ </p><p> </p><p>“–and way too smug.” </p><p> </p><p>Chiseled thighs work as leverage, Kara’s eyes gleaming when idle fingers spread across the length of her cheeks, pulling her in and shifting closer until their breaths mingle, and is Lena the one to flag down the boldness to bring her down for a kiss. Mouths slack open to an elicited pleased hum, Lena weaponizing her tongue to taste and take her in, whining in sympathy when Kara does and it rumbles in the flesh of her own lips. </p><p> </p><p>"And you’re a bad influence,” she breathes hard, inch-length away from her.</p><p> </p><p>Lena laughs, pats her cheek. "You’re not so innocent yourself."</p><p> </p><p>Kara remains seated, choosing to continue her lesson from the comfort of Lena's side, and Lena rests her head on her shoulder, weaving both arms around her forearm. </p><p> </p><p>"I was planning to show you the Canyons, but since we're here… I mapped out a route to all the tourist sites this hemisphere has." </p><p> </p><p>"Which are..."</p><p> </p><p>"Bokos and Juru Valley are the closest, but I loathe the former, and you already know the latter.” She shudders. “It’s scary.”</p><p> </p><p>"Isn’t that place where we went looking for Sam?"</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah." Her hand twitches when Kara squeezes three times, surely thinking of what transpired there. She clicks her tongue. "We’ve been at the Fire Falls and the Scarlet Jungle. So I added the Golden Volcano and Jewel Mountains to our journey, I know you'll love them," she says, excited at the prospect of sharing home with someone else, and Lena's heart overflows with love for this thoughtful woman.</p><p> </p><p>"I know I will." </p><p> </p><p>"Remember my mirror theory from the early days?" She waits, continues when Lena nods against her shoulder. "That must be the way. If we go in opposite directions, we'll find what we're looking for. I'll only know until we come across the Great Krypton Sea."</p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Lena is not trying to be disrespectful, much less whiny, or god forbid, to be portrayed as ungrateful. She is a loyal advocate of the exploration of exoplanets and alien life as a cultural means to broaden one’s learning curve—has dipped her toes into the subject from a young age, the rows of large telescopes she had people install in multiple L-Corp headquarters across the globe, and the nitpicked interest she has in this <em> specific </em> blonde specimen of this <em> specific </em>race are proof of that. </p><p> </p><p>But as morning bleeds into late twilight, both moons sealing a silvery sliver in the sky, Kara comes to a screeching halt, and it takes Lena employing all of her reflex stimuli to not bolt through her body like a ghost would. Immediately, she knows they've reached the Great Sea of Krypton, and it's easy to recognize because it's simply... water.</p><p> </p><p>Well, yes. Noun <em> Sea </em>spells out the expanse of water that surrounds all land masses—that probably applies to all celestial bodies that have even a slim chance of being habitable. She knows that the difference in the core foundations of their home planets doesn’t make a difference, water is crucial to every civilization with a goal to prevail and not be forgotten with its first successful cohort. </p><p> </p><p>But this Great Sea... is not so great.</p><p> </p><p>Perhaps Lena got used to being pampered with landscapes so incredible and impossible to recreate that this puddle failed to fulfill her wishes, drained her expectations and carried them away with its turbulent current. Perhaps she was waiting for something to happen, for the sea to divide in half and let Atlantis emerge from it, or for Rao itself to sink into the water after reaching the climax of its sunset. </p><p> </p><p>Anything, but not how similar this is to what she already knows.</p><p> </p><p>The kryptonian sea splits into three ways, as a maritime trifinio does. There’s a cliff where they stopped, and is the second to be the steepest drop, safe and yet unsettling as Kara digs her heel into the lush grass covering the edge of the chasm, glancing down before turning and looking up at her with a small satisfied smile on her face. As if the roar of the tide doesn’t allow her to hear Lena's heart beating in her throat.</p><p> </p><p>"Be careful," Lena calls, rooted to her spot no matter how much she wants to grab Kara by the collar of her blouse and yank her away. "Come on, get over here before you send me into cardiac arrest." </p><p> </p><p>Kara spins with such speed that Lena could swear the imprint left by her shoes will serve as a guide for when they're on the way back home. </p><p> </p><p>Grass groans from the roughness of her strides."We’re here!" raising her arms in the air with a maniacal grin, wandering over to Lena with an air of victory, she celebrates. “But I think you guessed that already." The expression on her face is diminished by an obvious grimace, but she quickly pulls out of it and turns her full attention to her.</p><p> </p><p>"You didn't mention it was going to be at least a hundred feet drop."</p><p> </p><p>"And you don't have to worry about that, okay?" Kara's hands clasps on either side of her hips, heavy and secure as careful eyes seek her gaze. "This is safe, I swear. Wouldn't have let you anywhere near if it wasn't." </p><p> </p><p>"Promise?" </p><p> </p><p>"You trust me?"</p><p> </p><p>There’s no doubt. "Always."</p><p> </p><p>Kara makes no hint of taking a step forward, kneading Lena's knuckle with her thumb and such gentleness that, for a second, she manages to convince Lena that they have the rest of their lives to wait for her to get over the sudden panic. </p><p> </p><p>"We didn't have bays around here." She blinks once, immersed in the drought of her self-absorption. Her free hand tugs at the straps of her backpack. "It was weird for a while, when I lived in Midvale. My family, the... um– the Danvers have a beach house, and it was the weirdest thing in the world to have the sea a few steps away and see that there were people who actually went in for a dip." </p><p> </p><p>"You didn’t do that here?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara shakes her head. "Water conditions sucked. Besides, we had ships or moving bridges to get to the other side."</p><p> </p><p>That awakens her senses, because they sure as hell don't have a ship and...</p><p> </p><p>"Moving bridges?"</p><p> </p><p>"Statistically, the safest around here. Dad helped design it." Blue eyes twinkle with pride, a formidable contrast to the hatred that boiled in them days before in said man's lab.</p><p> </p><p>"I miss the days when you were humble."</p><p> </p><p>Kara coughs, gaping like a fish. "I wasn't trying to– I didn’t want to brag."</p><p> </p><p>There she is. </p><p> </p><p>"I know, my love, was teasing." Lena shoves her hands into the back pockets of Kara's pants, flushing herself so close that her hip bones press against her sculpted abdomen. "I'd love to hear all about the things you and your family built here."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah?"  </p><p> </p><p>"Of course. To have backstage to this tech-based land? My inner nerd is having the time of her life." The answering smile Kara brandishes her with is oppressive, her cute little crinkle doing nothing to provide stability back into the thinning air. "It makes me happy that you're sharing this with me."</p><p> </p><p>"It feels right. It took me a while to realize what I was missing because–… well, like you said, I'm glad you're the one who got stuck here with me." The wind rustles behind them, stealthy in the laps it takes to rattle the grass protecting the cliff. </p><p> </p><p>Her skin burns where Kara presses her forehead against hers, and three universally known words incinerate the tip of her tongue and turns it to ashes after Lena forbids their way out, preventing them from escaping to set on stone an idea that will undoubtedly make this moment twist on its axis. </p><p> </p><p>It won't be her impulses that bring about the end of this. </p><p> </p><p>"So... bridges that move. Moses tried too hard."</p><p> </p><p>Is there a chance that it's watching Kara's reconnect with her faith the reason biblical figures barge into her mind before she can process her words? Either way, give her a break. This experience has been as tiring as it has been exciting.</p><p> </p><p>Lena glances over at the cliff, and some structure begins to materialize out of thin air. As if unseen machinery has accelerated the process of building an escape route to ensure they both reach the other side without further mishap.</p><p> </p><p>From there, level with the light layer of pollution that she noticed has grown as the days go by, the concept of death once again makes rounds. A possibility she hadn't given a second thought to for a few days now, confident that she would have Kara to protect her and help her overcome any threat they might face. </p><p> </p><p>The first few nights were spent sneaking out while Kara slept to try to find a way to get them out of there, but that problem-solving fervor gradually waned, and it's not even of her own volition. It's as if some unknown entity is trying to vacuum her ability to wonder about the outside world, attempting to make her forget why they're there and the dangerous consequences of their long-term stay. But she still holds set boundaries with ferocity, filling in for the two of them in the moments she notices Kara's mental gaps, the familiar landscape making her vulnerable and susceptible to being manipulated without her even realizing it.</p><p> </p><p>Even if Lena doesn't yet understand what the rules of this game are, she will of course put up a front and protect her kingdom.</p><p> </p><p>There are two possible outcomes she attaches to. Number one, she trusts Kara and they make it to the other side without any hiccups, their intellectual rendezvous fluctuating without the need to add <em> do not visit </em> under its final review on Krypton’s alternative for TripAdvisor. Number two, she allows her paranoia to creep under her skin and eat away at her from the inside out, because there’s a chance the premise of the bridge's safety is not the argument Kara so haughtily holds, and this is the moment where Lena puts the knowledge gleaned from her hypothesis about a life-or-death situation into practice.</p><p> </p><p>She broaches the subject with quibbled cautiousness... ish, clutching tightly at the fabric at Kara’s back as she saunters over to the bridge. "Don't make me regret trusting you."</p><p> </p><p>"Never again," Kara oaths, the lifebuoy that tethers her. Revving backwards, she trusts her muscle memory enough to know the steps to take. "Remember when we used to watch Harry Potter, how excited I got whenever I saw the Grand Staircase? I couldn't stop thinking about this."</p><p> </p><p>"You said you wanted to see something like that again."</p><p> </p><p>"A careless slip on my behalf, I admit, but I was comfy and you know I hold close to little power when you touch my hair." The wrinkles around her eyes become more pronounced as she guilt-trips one of them to shut close, and a remorseful lopsided smile blossoms from the string of her tight lips. "Now, we can take any direction we want. To the left–" she takes a step in the aforementioned direction, the entirety of Lena's muscle tissue retracts into a knot whose ends won’t untangle long after the bridge stops stirring, satisfied that it met its conductor's wishes–"is the robot factory– no, the zoo. I guess the factory would be to the right."</p><p> </p><p>Lena barely manages to nod, her tongue too numb and cotton-like in her mouth to express any emotion that doesn't hover around fear. She’s sure the skin on Kara’s forearms is about to break where she claws at it. </p><p> </p><p>"What d’you think if we set camp before the sun comes down?"</p><p> </p><p>“Yeah, whatever,” she rushes.</p><p> </p><p>“The volcano isn't too far from here but it'll get dark soon and–”</p><p> </p><p>“–let’s do it.”</p><p> </p><p>“Our home for the night is amazing, I swear you’re gonna lo–”</p><p> </p><p>"–if you don’t stop talking for a sec–"</p><p> </p><p>"–okay, you made it. It’s safe to open your eyes."</p><p> </p><p>Outcome number one takes the victory home, and they walk off the bridge without a scratch and Lena curses herself for having a second of hesitation, for not forcing Kara to drag them there sooner. </p><p> </p><p>Her oxygen reserves flee, an invisible fist driving up her gut to twist her airway. </p><p> </p><p>There... that's the panorama she revered in her earliest rant. It is breathtaking. Mesmerising. Awe-inspiring. The bridge flows into a cascade of lulling wonder, a piece out of Norse folklore. What was grass on the other side of the sea, here is an infinite horizon of glass, the waves of crimson photons positioning themselves to shed light on the stretch of crystal land and raise the prismatic effect of its reflection. </p><p> </p><p>Almost terrified to set foot down on earth and fracture the grace of this portrait of alien nature that Lena has begun to fall in love with beyond scientific value, she slides on her boots, jumping a small leap as she collides with a solid structure. </p><p> </p><p><em> "W</em><em>ow." </em> It isn’t her who mutters the encomium. Kara competes against Lena for first place in this mesmerizing race, lips pursed and eyes infested with that childlike curiosity she holds dear to her heart. "It's been so long."</p><p> </p><p>Her heart warms up when Kara sneaks her fingers in the slots between hers in a whim that is nature for both of them by now, but there’s no less reason to cease to be amazed that she is eager to cradle her hand and squeeze—to atone for the words she hasn’t said—just because she can. Because it's something she likes to do. Like force of nature.</p><p> </p><p>"This is..."</p><p> </p><p>"Right?" It's a fist to the ribs when Kara tears her eyes away from her, but she doesn't have the supercilious dignity to be offended by not being the spectacle that prompts blue orbs to gleam like a night full of blinking stars.</p><p> </p><p>Imposing, colossal blades rise from the cracks of the ground like control towers on a glass castle, casting a shadow of iridescent light that hurts her retinas when the sun rotates at a certain angle, and the hand she uses to cover her face is backlit against the firmament hovering above them.</p><p> </p><p>Air, on the other hand, goes down thicker in this stretch of land, and the leap into heavy humidity sticks her clothes to her damp skin, suffocating her and making her breathing more dense, a victim of the change in altitude. Water slides down her throat like a healing elixir, dragging with it the roughness within, but her mouth remains dry as a desert even though she hasn’t abandoned her bottle and consumed her bodyweight in hydrating fruits throughout the hike. </p><p> </p><p>Lena attributes, <em> blames </em>this loss of energy on Kara, and her own inability to tell her no, because her big dumb brain was zapped with the idea of having an intense make-out-session-inevitably-turned-more in the middle of nowhere, right up against one of the crystal pillars. </p><p> </p><p>The proof is in her wobbly knees, dishevelled ponytail and her delicious satiated state, a layer of ecstasy replacing the earlier exertion in her gaze. Kara, however, the lucky little devil, doesn't look unleveled at all. She looks as regal as always with her golden hair firm in place, as are her crumple-free clothes. And if there were anyone for Lena to accuse Kara of having handled her at her whim, she isn’t sure even the slick chin beneath the victorious smirk, the cramp induced by her leg hooked over Kara’s shoulder or the indentation the abrupt jerk of her head left when a broad, taut strip of sweet tongue quenched the heat coiling around the apex of her thighs, would be evidence for her defense to go unrefuted. </p><p> </p><p>Sometimes, she hates that a few well-placed caresses from Kara are enough to hit the drum and pull the trigger of her ruin. </p><p> </p><p>"Here’s good." Kara rudely interrupts her self-flagellation debate. "You must be exhausted, and it’s pretty late now."</p><p> </p><p>"And who's to blame for that?"</p><p> </p><p>"About it being late or your exhaustion?"</p><p> </p><p>"Both."</p><p> </p><p>"Probably me, but you weren’t complaining earlier." She glances up through sluggish eyelashes, a hundred alliterations of a Cheshire smile carved on her face, and Lena immediately knows she's up to no good. "Did I eat your tongue too?"</p><p> </p><p>Jesus fuck. <em> It's not fair.  </em></p><p> </p><p>"Make sure to find Rao when we get home."</p><p> </p><p>All across that deserted district, laughter booms into uneven guffaws and Kara rushes up to drape herself over Lena’s shoulder and hug her from behind, reducing her to a giggling mess as her head pops up from the corner of her eye and begins a kissing-attack to her face without warning. "This religious discipline does suit you."</p><p> </p><p>The hairs on her nape stand high on end when Kara ghosts above her, a shiver running the length of her spine as the wind blows and the cold sensation awakens where she had been nibbling on Lena’s lobe. </p><p> </p><p>"Look, no matter how tempting this horny bug that bit you is, we really need to sleep, just <em> sleep," </em>  Lena repeats after seeing her getting ready to intervene. "I don't plan on doing anything with you–… anything <em> else </em>in the middle of this field, haven't I made you watch enough horror movies to know how it ends?"</p><p> </p><p>Kara scoffs. "One too many."</p><p> </p><p>"Exactly. It's either that, or the worst prelude to some tacky interspecies porno." Her breath catches in her throat as she turns to Kara and sees her trying to stifle a snicker, a sheepish smile plastered on her handsome face to Lena’s detriment. She curls her fingers around the baby hairs that didn't quite make it into her updo, pulling away to get a better look at her. "Do we even have a bed?"</p><p> </p><p>"You suck the fun out of everything."</p><p> </p><p>"And you look like you're going to pass out any second." </p><p> </p><p>On cue, Kara yawns, the heaviness in her eyes increasing with each blink. "Nah, just wanna feel you close," she whispers, letting her forehead rest on Lena's chin.</p><p> </p><p>Lena wonders if they ever were to become a couple… a real couple—one in the books, out in the earthly wilderness—if they would be one of those annoying couplings that can’t keep their hands off each other. </p><p> </p><p>Someone attracted like a moth to human warmth and someone who’s touch-starved tend to be two colliding links of a struck match. </p><p> </p><p>"And you will as soon as we're safely under a roof. Now, where are we going to sleep? I didn't see a tent in that mess of a bag you carry."</p><p> </p><p>"Ah, my little human," Kara laments, using that petty term again. "Watch and learn."</p><p> </p><p>Rummaging through the smallest pocket on the side of her bag, Kara produces a cube colored of saturated sand, its polished bronze meddled with looped channels trailing from the middle of its faces to all its vertices, flowing like rivers as the blue spectrum of energy within undulates. </p><p> </p><p>"You  know how holographic projections work?" </p><p> </p><p>Lena arches an eyebrow. "I built an image inducer, a transmatter portal and a projector that catapults people into the Phantom Zone. That’s quite the experience when it comes to diffractive optics." </p><p> </p><p>"Uh, right." Kara pops her finger joints, scratches the back of her neck. "I'll just show you, you’ll see what I’m talking about.”</p><p> </p><p>To make sure the ground it's level, she pats the surface with her palm, making it suitable for whatever demonstration she has in mind. Sitting alone, the cube portrays a comical picture, as it lies on the floor, Kara's hands too big to manipulate it without a hint of awkwardness. She fidgets a few more seconds with the device until it starts hissing in crescendo, a sonic boom bursting her eardrums after the blue light Lena had seen dancing inside the cube flares up in a wave that envelops them both.</p><p> </p><p>There lies a three-dimensional photography, similar to that of the spheres, but more real.... </p><p> </p><p>Essentially tangible. </p><p> </p><p>As far as sizes go, the stretch of her eye sockets isn’t fit to house her aghast scrutiny when she realizes that's what it is. </p><p> </p><p>Six walls emerge from the cube, and the magnetic field enclosing them is as real as if Lena were to break through the makeshift barrier and run to the nearest tree to caress the roughness of its trunk. The projection doesn't have a very wide radius, and the home-warming items that materialize out of thin air and flood it with the static hum aren't exclusively large or luxurious as their home a few hours to the east, but her hand doesn't make it to the other side when the tips of her fingers stroke the wall, or when the pillow she holds is mellow and malleable where she presses. She can grasp it, can touch the walls and notice that the skylight is not a figment of her imagination, that the wooden floor is as compact as the one beneath it. </p><p> </p><p>Today has been a scientific field day for her.</p><p> </p><p>Synapses crackle as she attains cognition. She spins on her own axis, assimilating it, and despite a myriad of words in more than one alphabet lurking nearby, her speech freezes and is pulled by quicksand, barring Lena from blurting anything but a choked <em> how? </em></p><p> </p><p>"Shrinking tech." Lena nods, jaw slack open. "You put the blueprint inside the cube, and it amplifies it up to full scale. Same colors, same shape, same picture settings. The only thing it manipulates is the size." Kara is a shadow following and spying on her every drowsy move, humming as questions are thrown in her direction and returning them with royal explanations, back ramrod straight as she recites the tale she probably knows by heart. </p><p> </p><p>Miniscule details like the bottle of water on the night table next to her side of the bed, or the pillow already fluffied for her add bouts of intimacy to this quaint little place, and her heart flutters inside its box because there's too much resemblance to the vineyard cabin they used to rent on their weekend-long retreats to the outskirts National City for it to be a coincidence. The safety, the memory of some of the best nights of her life spent huddled there with Kara, lulls her to the same level of unattached passivity knowing that she spent hours drawing this precise location for Lena to get comfortable.. </p><p> </p><p>"Let me guess, your father's design?" Stinging in the stupor of her daze, Lena realizes she can't help but stroke the tattooed spine of that <em> tiv girod </em> journal. </p><p> </p><p>"Uh, no." Kara clicks her tongue. "Actually, it's one of mine."</p><p> </p><p>"You made this?"</p><p> </p><p>"My parents wouldn't let me sleep outside because they said it was dangerous, but I hated staying behind when my friends went out stargazing."</p><p> </p><p>"So, you basically solved homelessness and built portable places so you could have sleepovers."</p><p> </p><p>Shrugging, her trademark crinkle makes an appearance. She nods vigorously anyway. "Yeah, <em> basically." </em> </p><p> </p><p>Lena shuffles back on her heels, resting her shoulders on the ledge behind her, and she soon is drilling Kara with a hungry look. </p><p> </p><p>Out of boredom, Kara designed one of the most interesting inventions Lena has seen. It's worth mentioning that the chances are she did that some time before Krypton. The notion of Kara as a single digit year old, sketching designs in sheets of paper while sitting on her bent legs in the corner of the lab while her father worked on something else invades all of Lena’s senses and crowds them again with renovated fondness for this sharp, crafty edge. </p><p> </p><p>There is so much uncharted depth to her character. If Lena was amazed by the shallow surface before, she can't even fathom what awaits her beneath every layer she can now peel away without being slowed by her own modesty. She wishes she could strip her skull and bare her brain, if only to get answers as to what's inside, but that's not a possibility she can indulge herself with without having to perform a quasi-lobotomy on her best friend. What is a potent possibility at this very moment, however, is to strip her bare—be damned the cheeky, voyeuristic porn. </p><p> </p><p>It's only terrible, head-to-toe blood-rush-bolting kind of embarrassing, that this is what gets her engine running. But one look at Kara, rocking back and forth with her eyes closed and a soporific flow, winds her down as fast as she was winded up. </p><p> </p><p>"Bedtime for you, kid." After undoing the buckle of Kara’s belt, helping her free herself from her pants, Lena kneels in front of her to untie the knot on her boots and let the garment skimm down her legs. "Want to eat something before you go to sleep?" she asks, ignoring the tender look Kara matches her with. Not even herself knows where this nurturing side comes from.</p><p> </p><p>"Nah, I’m good." She pats her stomach, jaw nearly dislodging from the rest of her skull with the ferocity of her yawn. "I'm still full from the– hey, I didn't see my Twellian today."</p><p> </p><p>Refraining from the consequences, Lena rolls her eyes. "I packed them on my bag, but I forgot to give them to you earlier."</p><p> </p><p>"Oh, no prob. You can keep them." Kara lunges forward to kiss her cheek and then flops onto her back. Lena is still reeling from the fact a projection is holding them up to focus on the lightness airing her vessels. What the hell can she do with bottles of liquid sugar, anyway? But the intention is enough to weave a beguiled smile on her face. </p><p><br/>
<br/>
<br/>
</p><p> </p><p>Sleep doesn't come as easy as she thought it would.</p><p> </p><p>The events of the day have left her exhausted, like her whole body is one hundred percent water and that's why it won't let her move a limb without snatching a groan from her. Her brain, on the other hand, is as light as feathers, spinning round and round and <em> round, </em> never falling ally to the submission the rest of her organs have given into.</p><p> </p><p>She has too many questions, many more that there were twelve hours before. But they all lead to the same place. Almost.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> If they were limited to Argo's end line, how could they possibly have made it this far? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Will she manage to fool Kara if the places they're headed to don't meet her expectations? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> How’s she supposed to sleep if Kara won’t turn around and spoon her? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>And the ones that go off on a darker side. </p><p> </p><p>Why is Kara so calm about all of this? </p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Why does Lena have the suspicion she's ignoring what's really going on and keeps forgetting pertinent things about their life out there with each passing day?  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Speaking of the outside world, did they save Brainy? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> And… could it be that Kara being stuck here too is enough to keep the ones on the other side from giving up on their quest so quickly? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>As much as she loathes to ask for help, her tiny boxes are already overflowing, but this time she doesn't believe Kara is in the right frame of mind to be able to provide her with answers.</p><p> </p><p>Lena rolls onto her side to find out that Kara is still wide awake and tapping an uncoordinated loop with her index finger on her own pillow. Tired blue eyes widen before returning to their normal size, but she does nothing else to acknowledge that neither of them has succumbed to sleep. </p><p> </p><p>"What's that?" The repetitive rhythm is getting on her nerves, but she won't be the one to make it stop, not when she knows it's a coping mechanism responding to whatever thought has Kara breathing so shallowly. </p><p> </p><p>"Bits of your heartbeat I can remember."</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Oh. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>Easy. She can do it. It's not the first time Kara's said things like that when she's in the wavering limbo of sleep. </p><p> </p><p>Lena does wrap her hand around her wrist, and squeezes so the pressure grounds her. "Can't sleep?”</p><p> </p><p>"Nope, not really, can you?"</p><p> </p><p>"Neither, guess it's the leftover adrenaline still coursing through my body."</p><p> </p><p>"I'm scared," Kara blurts out, searching Lena's eyes through the gloom. "I used to love sleeping outdoors, but now… we're here, but I know this Rao isn't my Rao, and the stars really aren't my stars. The last time I saw these same constellations, I was trapped in a pod and... I don’t like how it feels."</p><p> </p><p>Her stomach plummets down to the fake uranium core before it surges back up with a choked sob and a sour taste. It takes half a phlegmatic blink of Kara's eyes for Lena to scooch closer to hold her, guiding Kara’s hand to her chest to let her perceive the real beat.</p><p> </p><p>"Darling." She keeps her voice low, pleading for her attention. "This is scary, but I promise it's not dangerous. You're safe here."</p><p> </p><p>"I know we are but… I'm just– just being silly."</p><p> </p><p>"You are not,” she punctuates, “it must hurt, and it's more than okay for you to feel scared. This is new, and you're doing a good job. You're the strongest person I know and I'm so–" one kiss on her forehead–"so–" two on her eyelids–"so proud of you." Three on the tip of her nose.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I'm in love with you, too. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>"You are?"</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> I think I have been all my life. </em>
</p><p> </p><p>"Without a doubt." Letting the promise hang in the air, Kara snuggles closer against her, infinitely small next to Lena, and drops her head to her chest with a sigh that falters as she begins to massage her scalp. "Tell me something? Anything, a memory that makes you happy."</p><p> </p><p>Kara mulls over it, remains silent for a few seconds, only their quiet breaths can be heard. Lena stretches her neck to kiss the crown of her head when a breath turns into a small chuckle. </p><p> </p><p>"A few miles past the place we're headed to there's an anti-gravity palace," she begins, charting a path with her little finger on Lena's bent leg. "Father used to tell me that's where he and Mom met, but he was shitless scared because it was his first time there, and you kinda have to have training if you don't want to look like a balloon floating from side to side."</p><p> </p><p>"I'm afraid I have an inkling for where this is going."</p><p> </p><p>"He was a rookie, a rookie with a crush. So as soon as he saw her, he lost control of his gear and ended up crashing against her, the jets hitting her head."</p><p> </p><p>Lena groans, pinches the bridge of her nose because she’s way too familiar with this clumsiness. "Does <em> El </em>stand for charmingly awkward?"</p><p> </p><p>"Nope, <em> El </em>stands for star." Fitting. Lena is destined to the stars, after all. "I'll have you know we're pretty graceful, even if he did give her a concussion the first day they met</p><p> </p><p>Comparing herself to Alura is one of the last things she wants to do, but she can’t help but have sympathy. God knows she was lightheaded too the day Kara walked into her office for the first time.</p><p> </p><p>"What a great love story."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah, they were. Dad was a hopeless romantic, sinned and committed the cliché of asking her to marry him in the same place they met." Kara sighs, hiding her face. "I miss them, or the idea I had of them, at least."</p><p> </p><p>"Would you go back to Krypton, if you had the chance?" The question is as much for Kara as it is for herself, because these have been times of introspection, and she wonders if one thing would have been different, if she had ever taken the left instead of the right...</p><p> </p><p>"If I didn't know what I know now, without a doubt. I would have ripped the opportunity out of someone's hands if I had been asked this question when I was a brooding teenager. I can't lie and say the idea isn't tempting, Rao knows I almost stayed there when Mom asked me to." She blows out a long breath, and hooks her right leg with Lena's. "And I wish I could see Dad one last time and be able to say goodbye to him, the way I did with Alura and some of my old friends. </p><p> </p><p>“But I've spent a bigger portion of my life here than I did back at Krypton, and I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. Earth is my home now. You, my family, my friends, you all are as important as they once were for me. I can't help but think if anything had been different..." Kara looks up at her.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Would I have met you? </em>
</p><p> </p><p>It's as if their minds are connected, too.</p><p> </p><p>"I get that. Despite everything, I don't think I'd change what I have now for anything in the world.”</p><p> </p><p>"But that doesn't mean we miss them any less, or that there aren't nights we don’t dream about having them back." Kara shrugs and lifts her hand in the air for Lena to reach. "I miss sitting on Dad's lap listening to the council talk for hours on end.”</p><p> </p><p>"Were children allowed in?"</p><p> </p><p>"Not really. But I was part of the Guild before I was even born, it was a headstart."</p><p> </p><p>"Sweet nepotism at its best." She hisses when Kara flicks her thigh. "I’m joking, even if you hid it well I know you’re a genius." Kara tucks her face in the crook of Lena’s neck, the sudden heat emanating from flushed cheeks surprises Lena. For someone with such a cocky front, she doesn't know how to take a compliment. "What about your mother?"</p><p> </p><p>Right away, she deflates against her torso and inhales a sharp breath. "Like I told you days ago, she was the best, really. But the last days of Krypton I barely even saw her. She was away from home and when she came back she was usually irritated or too busy to be with me, so I drifted closer to Dad. Sometimes I think I lost her long before the explosion, but I understand. They were rushing to save the world," she speaks with such nostalgia, her innocence justifying actions that are familiar to Lena, and it pains her to think she is holding on to a misconception of certain character traits that, from the edges, she is beginning to understand.</p><p> </p><p>Her parents sound like hell with every memory she confides in her, and the thrill of having shared time and traded philosophy with Alura Zor-El now begins to season into resentment. She can't even begin to imagine the amounts of pain Kara continues to hide beneath her seams for the sake of others, the recycled agony of knowing that her family influenced the loss of her everything and yet neglected her the knowledge and companionship that was so crucial at a time like that.</p><p> </p><p>One's moral compass has to be very pretty fucked up to do the things they did to her.</p><p> </p><p>Lena goes off on a tangent, because she knows she can't argue with Kara without desecrating her mother's spirit in the name of defending her. She chooses a topic mentioned days earlier with the hopes of turning light the dark tide.</p><p> </p><p> "Something about your aunt, Astra?" she knows she made the right choice when Kara propels herself to sit cross-legged and pushes her hair away from her face, jutting her chest out and looking at her with a renewed gleam in her eye.</p><p> </p><p>"So cool and such a badass!” Kara slams both hands on the mattress.  “She loved traveling, so I couldn't see her that often, but the times she came to visit I didn’t part from her side. She knew about everything, would have been an excellent asset in any guild, but she chose the Warrior Guild." Cupping her own cheeks, adopting a wary expression, Kara scratches her temple with a grimace. "Mom hated it when she taught me war tactics, said they weren't things a young lady like me should learn."</p><p> </p><p>Biting her tongue or slandering a spirit. Maybe something in the middle, petty but not offensive. Honest. "Astra sounds like the best company around here."</p><p> </p><p>"Yeah..."</p><p> </p><p>"Where is she now? You said Fort Rozz–"</p><p> </p><p>"–dead."</p><p> </p><p>Ah, shit.</p><p> </p><p>If they were sitting on a real bed, Lena is sure Kara would be wrapping loose threads around her finger. A dozen emotions fluctuate on her face, and all comprise forced resignation. "Yes," she continues, "it was the year before you moved to the city. She and her husband came along with their army to cause trouble, and in one of those battles my sister... uh–"</p><p> </p><p>There it is again, the leak of information. Lena frowns and yet provides, "Alex."</p><p> </p><p>"Yes, Alex. She had to– Astra was going to kill... J'onn? She was going to kill him, so Alex got there first. A kryptonite sword right through her chest." A hand is held over her own ribcage, Kara being there but at the same time in the faces of the moons.</p><p> </p><p>Shit. Fuck. Shit. Fuck. <em> Fuck. </em> </p><p> </p><p>"I'm so sorry, Kara. I wouldn't have asked if I had known."</p><p> </p><p>"It's okay." She smiles, grabbing the hand resting in the gap between them. "That was a long, long time ago."</p><p> </p><p>No, it's not okay. </p><p> </p><p>It's not okay and Lena curses all the entities that ever made her believe that. That burying thoughts goes hand in hand with burying coffins, forever forgotten and swept under the dirt.</p><p> </p><p>Death is a traumatic event in itself, painful when it is kept far away. But when its omnipotence wields the cold edge of its axe with no remorse for whom it may take along the way, and that way is one you and your loved ones have taken before, it only makes it worse. It is enough of a concept to chill bones and cripple people down to a living deathbed. And Kara has lost so many people, in quite traumatic situations… it's impossible to figure out how she’s still standing. </p><p> </p><p>Now, Lena recognizes what that obscure mass that sometimes lurks in blue eyes means. Knows why it flickers with wrath at the mention of violence or death, that roars and tries to break the chains to make a grand escape. She already understands the darkness that drew her to Kara, as polar opposites do.</p><p> </p><p>How does all that amount of trauma fail to change someone's entire moral marrow? Kara really is a wonder, and Lena will fight tooth and nail to have the fissures in her soul addressed. It's the least she can do after Kara did the same with her.</p><p> </p><p>"Someday, you’ll get back that same kind of peace you give."</p><p> </p><p>"I feel quite at peace here, with you."</p><p> </p><p>Under the twin halo of moonlight, Lena is struck by the realization that this is <em> it </em>for her. She's been saved, released from her curse and rewarded with a second chance, and while she has no idea what fate has in store for them, she'll be fine as long as Kara is by her side to cherish and take care of her, the same way she'd slit her palm and stretch it out on spellbound stone to promise she will.</p><p> </p><p>Because she loves her so much. So, <em> so </em>much.</p><p> </p><p>"Kal is the only blood relative I have left," she adds as an afterthought, her closed eyelids fluttering as Lena softly strokes the slope of her nose with her fingerprint. "But we were never that close, given he bailed and dropped me off with the Danvers and all.”</p><p> </p><p>Lena reels back. "Why didn't you stay with him?" </p><p> </p><p>"No clue. He left and it hurt for years because he was the only one I had from before. But Kal grew up, set a life for himself with priorities of his own, I guess." Kara tips her head a little to the right, kissing the pad Lena now skims along the curve of her cheek. "I don’t care why anymore, but I was thirteen when our parents asked me to watch over him, and there wasn’t a single second where I thought of leaving him stranded… well, before I got stuck. And then again, he was twenty-five when my pod landed, and his best idea was to ditch me with a group of strangers and never visit again."</p><p> </p><p>"I don’t understand.” Blood rushes to her ears, flushing red as she presses further. “Was it about money? Time? You two are sun-powered, it's not like you would have starved to death."</p><p> </p><p>Her laughter is infectious. "That's what I always said! We could have made a home in the Fortress, the one our parents built for <em> both </em>of us. But I guess I was a walking reminder of Krypton for him, and I could never blame him, I'm glad he doesn't have to carry that kind of weight on his shoulders."</p><p> </p><p>"Well, I can blame him for you. He sounds like a super-asshole to me."</p><p> </p><p>"Survival instinct kicked in, choosing to stay away from the ticking time bomb I was." Looping her long arms around bent legs, she props her chin on the top of her knee. There are bags under her eyes, exhaustion running weary and bone-deep as her movements convey, but she's holding back sleep to keep the momentum of their vulnerable exchange. Lena is doing the same. "Now he’s happy, and has a beautiful family. I love Lois and, even if I’ve seen Jon like two and a half times, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for my nephew. That is all my aunt and uncle wanted for him."</p><p> </p><p>"But..."</p><p> </p><p>"It sucks that you know me so well." Kara laughs, the gathered tail bounces with her, faux frustration lilting her accent. "Sometimes I wonder if I'll get that kind of happiness too. What if he's the only one destined to live a fulfilling life, and I'm doomed to pick up the debris of my– our planet?"</p><p> </p><p>Slithering the inches of distance between them, Lena breaches in and invades her personal space, fixing both hands on her cheeks. </p><p> </p><p>"You will, you'll find someone and you'll be the happiest person in the world. I promise," she attests. Even though it shatters her bones, her heart, her soul to think that there is a slim possibility that she may not be Kara’s happy ending, Lena has no doubt in her mind that the universe will wise up and atone for everything it has put her through. </p><p> </p><p>Kara kisses the palm of her hand, holding it down. "Tonight has taken a really sad turn."</p><p> </p><p>"Sorry to burst your bubble, but I do sad for a living, this is barely warm up."</p><p> </p><p>"Can I kiss you?" Kara's splaying her hands down Lena’s back and pulling them flush together to catch her mouth before she even finishes nodding, pressing a rough yet gentle kiss to her lips with such fervor that it restores everything she knows to be real. Her tongue tugs for a way in, sucking on Lena’s until she’s satisfied with the sounds she pulls from her. When she leans away to obey her lungs, it is with a swollen smile and ruffled hair. "I love doing that. Why weren’t we doing that before?”</p><p> </p><p>"I have that exact same question." </p><p> </p><p>"Who would have guessed that a couple of kisses would render Supergirl useless?" she points out with a lopsided grin, dodging the swat Lena launches toward her shoulder. "Didn't tell lies. The kryptonite market would have plummeted if they'd known."</p><p> </p><p>"Lex is the one actively keeping it afloat."</p><p> </p><p>"Was."</p><p> </p><p>"What?"</p><p> </p><p>"You do this thing where you use present tense when talking about him." Kara gulps. Time stands still, and all she has left to do is wait for the punchline to barrel through. "Babe, he's gone."</p><p> </p><p>It begins with the numbing of her limbs from the bottom up, panic it is, coursing through her arteries like shards of ice slashing and flooding Lena with her own frozen blood until her chest tightens. Her heart strains hard to keep pumping to the rest of her body, working to not let her engine shut down and gobble her up with the paralysis that whispers things under the hard bone of her skull, in a deep, strong tenor unmistakable to her. </p><p> </p><p>All of a sudden, this infinite place becomes the cage it is, the prison her brother put her in for the simple fact that his egomania wouldn't let him accept that Lena was willing to part from her name if it meant Kara, her real family, would no longer be in the direct line of danger. </p><p> </p><p>"I'm sorry, but I didn't know how to approach this and you… that's a good thing, isn't it? That that happened." Kara tries desperately to fix a mistake that isn't even a mistake, throwing words into the air to dissuade the ghost she brought to the metaphorical table, but Lena is so far gone, the walls caving in and shrinking until she's barely a compressed mass of atoms inside this hexagonal room, gasping for air and to find a lifeline other than Kara's, fearing that holding onto her will pull her too close and Lena’s darkness will wither the light that guides her home.</p><p> </p><p>She is petrified, lost in a train of thought whose tail she needs to find to make sure it is there, that Lex really is dead and there will be no higher power to bring him back to haunt her in his third life. </p><p> </p><p>Lena saw it with her own eyes, she reminds herself to be sure, remembers her hands filled with the blood flowing from the wound of a defeated god, Kara losing consciousness in her arms. She watched as her mother took the initiative and three steps to finish him off. She saw her brother's eyes close for one last time, right before hers closed and brought her here.</p><p> </p><p>He's dead. Lex is dead. The eternal perpetrator of her greatest nightmare is gone. </p><p> </p><p>So why does Lena still think it's his hand squeezing her neck that's the reason her lungs are being licked up by fire?</p><p> </p><p>"It's too good," she replies, only realizing by how hard it is for her to utter words through trembling lips that she's crying. "It's <em> too </em>good to be true. What if– I don't know, he always seems to find a way to come back."</p><p> </p><p>She's been through this before. </p><p> </p><p>Lena put two bullets in his chest, said goodbye to the person who caused most of her traumas in the name of protecting the group of people who did their part to heal them. But while he was choking with his own blood, Lex managed to pull a parting move, an outsmarting and a checkmate in a last game that would sweep away the pieces she had worked so hard to put back together. </p><p> </p><p>Then he came back. </p><p> </p><p>She took his life, he almost took hers. And then Lex Luthor was the only person she could and had to trust if she wanted to survive in the parody that the crisis rewrote. </p><p> </p><p>Out of the corner of her eye, Lena can see Kara's fingers flex with the agonizing desire to reach out and soothe her dread, but she doesn't, and as grateful as she is that she respects her already established boundary of not being touched when she is overwhelmed, she needs something to ground her before it's too late and she floats away with the night. Lena glances up and nods, giving Kara the green light, and the pursing of her lips is not enough of a barrier to the frightened sob that escapes her when Kara wraps her up in a constricting hug. </p><p> </p><p>"He won't." Their labored breaths are almost equal, and the unsure foundation of their embrace cannot be discerned and likewise attributed to either of them. Her voice is weak, trying to absorb with her speech the palpable fear. "He won't come back, we'll make sure of that."</p><p> </p><p>"Kara. you don’t understand," she rushes, fist-wrestling the lump in her throat, "if there's even the slightest chance that he– I can't face him ever again. Kara– <em> Kara, </em>he's a monster and I–"</p><p> </p><p>"Hey, take a breath. Please, try to breathe with me, okay? Rao, you’re shaking." Not much is visible beneath the fog of thick tears dusting her eyelashes, but she can feel Kara, and hear the pace of her breathing. There aren't many things she's tried as hard in her life as she does trying to match the up and down of their chests. "Yeah, babe, like that. You’re doing perfect."</p><p> </p><p>"What if–"</p><p> </p><p>"I'll turn every stone on the face of the earth to make sure he doesn't come back. I promise I'll keep you safe." Kara combs back the strands of sweaty hair stuck to her face for her, the promise to keep them safe simmering in her eyes. "We'll figure this out, together. We always do."</p><p> </p><p>Lena dances on the verge of tears for the next few minutes, ribs aching where they did an excellent performance of forbidding her heart from leaping out of her chest. Light fingers caress the notches of her spine, whistling as they join the cold sweat that clings to her skin. Even locked away in Kara’s mellow embrace, she still doesn't feel entirely safe, but blaming herself won't take her forward, so she climbs into her lap and rejoices in the starlight graze of the woman she loves. </p><p> </p><p>"I have an idea." Kara utters the words against the back of her head, dreading that a mismatched decibel in the volume of her voice will pull the trigger. "But we'll have to go out for a while, you want to? Get some fresh air and all that."</p><p> </p><p>The distinctive stench of guilt lingers in the room, Kara lightly touching her elbow to help her stand up, and it doesn’t take a human genius to realize it's her exuding it in benign waves, biting her lip and wiping her hands on the fabric of her shirt as she guides them out of their home for the night</p><p> </p><p>"Kara." She links her pinky with Kara’s, pulls in calling but gets ignored. “Love.”</p><p> </p><p>"Huh?"</p><p> </p><p>"Look at me." As if rubbed on a magic lamp, her order instantly becomes reality. "I’m okay, this is not your fault."</p><p> </p><p>Her eyebrows pull down. "I shouldn’t have brought it up right now.” </p><p> </p><p>"There is no proper time when it comes to him. This conversation was bound to be brought up sooner or later. Let's just be glad it's out of the way."</p><p> </p><p>"I didn't mean to upset you."</p><p> </p><p>"What did you want to show me, anyway?"</p><p> </p><p>She nods, noticing the roundabout in subject. "Be right back." Kara squeezes her hand, leaving her alone for a fleeting second before reemerging with her hands occupied by small glass poles. Lena trails behind her, gracefully kneels beside her. "Our culture had this ritual where we used to honour the fallen ones."</p><p> </p><p>Her skin bristles, and Lena is aware that the crisp weather of this dark night is not the cause. "Show me how."</p><p> </p><p>Kara nods again, placing in front of them the crystals she collected earlier, and fuels her lungs with a deep breath. "These are sunstone crystals. Not fully developed yet, that’s why these bad guys fit in the palm of my hand, not like–" she swivels her hand around the bastions–"these. They light up at the first contact with water underground, and burn until we finish our prayers."</p><p> </p><p>"Okay, so..."</p><p> </p><p>"Wanna go first?" Kara asks with a hand covering the bone of her knee. Mirth dances in her eyes, mirroring the halo of the moons, and Lena forgets she was asked something. "I can do it, if you want."</p><p> </p><p>"For Jack," she says, a feeble mezzo. "It's unfair, the way he died. But Jack was the best part of me the years we spent together. I can’t thank him enough for what he did for me." Staring up at Kara, she notices she is already being watched.</p><p> </p><p>With an encouraging smile on her part, she steers Lena's hand holding the crystal. Like a beast breaking through the surface of deep waters, the floor makes the staff part of it, taking it as a symbiote does with its host. When it is secure, set in place, more than half buried in the crust of the field, wisps of colour shed within itself, lengthened like a gaslit flame until a beam of amber light shoots upward toward the sky to illuminate it with a warm glow, emanating a cloud of heat that is quick to envelop them as well. </p><p> </p><p>Lena can only stare open-mouthed. </p><p> </p><p>"To Kenny, my best friend in high school." Kara goes after her, repeating the same process. "After landing on Earth, the first months were scary, but he made them better. Wherever he is, I hope he knows he saved me."</p><p> </p><p>"If you don't mind, I'd like to light this one for Astra." It becomes heavier in her hands, a lead bar that Kara fixes with a gaze so intense, she doesn't know if the fire she sees in her eyes is the reflection of the sunstones or something of her own. "Love wasn’t a foreign concept when it came to your camaraderie. You loved her and she loved you, it was that easy. I never got to meet her, but I thank her for being there for you when you needed her."</p><p> </p><p>Failing miserably to train herself steady, Lena watches as a third blade of light emerges to wash away the black dregs of the sky in a more welcoming hue. She watches Kara, too, who just can't take her eyes off her, even as she wipes away the lonely tears with the collar of her blouse. </p><p> </p><p>Every torch set alight is an overwhelming reminder of how many people Kara has lost. There are names she is familiar with, like <em> Jeremiah, </em>  whom she thanked for giving her a new family. Other characters in her plot she fails to recognize, but Lena knows from the pensive speech Kara bids them farewell with, that they were important enough to stay forever with her. There's an <em> Oliver, </em>  someone named <em> Thara </em> , and between the twitch of surprised lips and the crinkle etched in her face, Lena manages to decipher something that sounds out like <em> Mikhail. </em> </p><p> </p><p>"For Lex, the kid who was your brother," Kara adds, "despite the person he grew into, I know there was a time in life where you were allies. I pray for the little boy who opened his arms to you and made you feel at home."</p><p> </p><p>The knot that has been sizing up like a snowball rolling down a hill clogs her ability to take a minute and backtrack. But Lena understands, there’s residual grievance for having lost the boy whose jam sandwiches in the wee hours of the morning were the greatest source of comfort for her, who kept a warm space in his bed for the nights when her nightmares required seeking someone else than a teddy bear. </p><p> </p><p>Her mental strength is absorbed as quickly as the darkness does. Sitting on her haunches, Lena drops her shoulders with a sigh, leaking the heavy energy and releasing it through her pores. She's depleted, and so she lets Kara know, who shoots back a <em> it gets like this sometimes, let me finish </em> and takes the lead with no trouble at all. </p><p> </p><p>"This one's for Krypton." The trembling of her hands strings a shriek as the crystal scratches the floor, but she manages to embed it without distress, holding her own hands and placing them in her lap. The golden tint outlines the twists and turns of her face in an almost ethereal way, a magnet she can't stop being attracted to. "For my home, for my parents, my family and all the people I lost in this place. The day will come when thinking of them doesn’t feel like nails slitting my skin, but I'm willing to face the pain if it means I keep them with me, alive in my head."</p><p> </p><p>Lena pats around until she finds Kara, holding her as close as she can. A constant reminder that she's there. That, even if she had the chance, she wouldn’t go anywhere.</p><p> </p><p>One last piece lies abandoned in what used to be a pile. They both look at it, and turn to look at each other at the same time, a question on the tip of her tongue and an answer on Kara's when she says:</p><p> </p><p>"I carry honour to say goodbye to your mother, too. We haven’t had many conversations about her, and I appreciate the times you've chosen to share this with me, as hard as this is for you. I want you to know that something I'm sure of, is that she was a wonderful woman, that she loves you with her whole heart, and that she's so proud of you, of the beautiful person you grew up to be."</p><p> </p><p>And how is Lena supposed to take this? </p><p> </p><p>There is no more astonishing setting than to see the crystals standing upright to commend the people who shaped them, the people who tied the thread that binds them together. But she thinks that this exact fragment of time, as Kara beams at her with such love and the promise of everlasting devotion hangs in the air, could easily become the favorite memory of her life. Because there she is with the best person who could have crossed her path, and unknowingly, with her ethical genuineness, Kara is mending a fracture that Lena swore would be beyond repair, never have a cure.</p><p> </p><p>How can Kara sit there and let her eyes flit heavenward with such serenity? As if her words aren’t mending her, as if they aren't all she needed to hear when she was a kid. As if she wasn’t Lena’s absolute everything. </p><p> </p><p>Past, present and future. She has left a permanent mark on her. </p><p> </p><p>Kara addresses her mother with confidence, giving voice to a question that Lena has carried like a cross since she saw her mother fade away for good, and she has answered a never-asked-before question with such earnestness that it brands her with a spine-tingling resolution.</p><p> </p><p>It is incredible to think of how much she loves her, almost impossible to measure the limits of her affections for Kara. She has no strength to thank this girl, drowning in her own tears because even though her belief in unscripted faith is rather weak, Lena knows it was her mother who put Kara in her way, who chose this sun-kissed angel to protect her and spill the confessions she always wished her mother was the one to remind her of.</p><p> </p><p>She is grateful for both of them. For the woman who was her first hero, and the girl who will be her last. Thankful for Kara, who has her mother in her prayers, in the midst of her culture, and celebrates a foreign face in this sacred healing ritual.</p><p> </p><p>Kara clears her throat, cutting off the worship Lena was composing for her. "You have been the sun of our lives. Our prayers will be the sun that lights your way on the journey home. We will remember you in every dawn." Her voice cracks, a shaky sigh following its tail. "And await the night we join you in the sky. Rao's will be done."</p><p> </p><p>It is cathartic, the way she crosses her hand over the raised crystal bars and they glow fiercely, as if in retaliation for her prayer's intentions.</p><p> </p><p>Silence reigns over them, each engaged in individual farewells to the people whose names are whispered in the seams of the quietest of nights. Lena, on her behalf, is facing an onslaught of recently unveiled emotions, her pulse losing its temper as she gazes at Kara, the peace on her face hard to compare to anything else. </p><p> </p><p>Lena Luthor, for all her experience staying shut when something bothers her, can't take it anymore. Can't take another second without letting her know. </p><p> </p><p>"You know I love you, right?" she confesses once blue eyes flutter back open.</p><p> </p><p>"Of course I do, silly."</p><p> </p><p>"No." Lena shakes her head and siphons courage from the love swimming in her veins. "You know I <em> love </em> you, but you don't know I'm <em> in love </em> with you."</p><p> </p><p>Maybe it's her own assumption. She's probably making visions up in order not to let herself down, but Lena can swear she sees the three seconds it takes for Kara to fade away into ashes and rise again like a phoenix.  </p><p> </p><p>Then, her smile is brighter than any star she knows.</p><p> </p><p>"You– you are?" the happiness on her face is almost comical. Her cheeks are beet red, her eyebrows shooting up to reach her hairline. It comes as such a surprise that Lena has to ask herself if Kara is seriously so oblivious to the Sapphic nature of their relationship. </p><p> </p><p>"You are my best friend, Kara Zor-El, you are my heart and soul. Of course I’m in love with you."</p><p> </p><p>Lena should be out of control, all over the place on the climax of her confession, but she can't help but plunge into her personal nirvana. Everything they've worked for comes down to this vehement and passionate love. The universe has finally aligned to let them be.</p><p> </p><p>At the happiest peak of her life, as the sunstone lights go out, she has to hold a sobbing Kara into her chest for the rest of the night.</p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Crystal of Knowledge: a five-sided Kryptonian crystal that contains all the knowledge of the planet and all the knowledge of the universe gathered by its people.<br/>Fanff: six days, making a Kryptonian "week."<br/>Twellian: a succulent fruit native to Krypton.<br/>Sunstone: used both as a building material and as a form of computer system. The Fortress of Solitude incorporates them into its design. </p><p> </p><p>the show will be back and a few days, so this is me wishing you all good luck. we're going to need it. love you kids &lt;3</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>If you made it to this little note, thank you so much for reading and spending your time with me! Feel free to leave kudos and comment if you’re up to, or come to my <a href="https://twitter.com/luthorhood">twitter</a> to say hi. Hope you're having an amazing day whenever you read this!♡</p></blockquote></div></div>
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